SPACE – A
LIMITLESS DIMENSION
Researched and Compiled for FINS by ‘Sardar
Sanjay Matkar
01 October 2018
PRELUDE
Since the evolution of mankind
began, approximately 15 million years ago; we have looked up at the sky and
wondered about the moon and the stars and the occasional dramatic events we see
there. But, it is only in the past 40 years that mankind has developed the
technology and technical capability to visit other astral bodies in the
universe.
The first rocket that could fly
high enough to get into space was the V2 missile launched by Germany in 1942.
The first rocket that had the capability to launch a satellite into space was
the Russian R7-ICBM that launched the space satellite ‘Sputnik’. What followed
thereafter was a race between America and Soviet Union, to travel into space
with unmanned probes and manned space-craft. During the last four decades,
hundreds of satellites, probes and space shuttles have been launched, which
have explored near-Earth space, traveled to the Moon and to all planets except
Pluto. And, with permanent space stations already in orbit around Earth and
telescopes exploring more and more of our universe, space research is still
continuing. Talk of future developments includes building a colony on Mars,
searching for life in other galaxies, and other exciting programs.
Travel into Space is only
possible is if we can escape Earth's gravitational field. For a spacecraft to
do so it must reach a velocity of 11 km/sec (or 39,600 km/hr ). It was only by
the middle of the twentieth century that mankind finally understood enough
about rocket science to make such high speeds attainable.
Space; as we know it today; consists of the
solar system; made up of the Sun and everything that orbits around it,
including planets, moons, asteroids, comets and meteoroids. It extends from the
Sun, and goes past the four inner planets, through the Asteroid Belt to the
four gas giants and on to the disk-shaped Kuiper Belt and far beyond to the
teardrop-shaped heliopause. Scientists estimate that the edge of the solar
system is about 9 billion miles (15 billion kilometers) from the sun. Beyond
the heliopause lies the giant, spherical Oort Cloud, which is thought to
surround the solar system.
Our solar
system consists of an average star we call the Sun, in the following order the planets;
starting
nearest the sun and working outward through the solar system: Mercury,
Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Planet Nine. It
includes: the satellites of the planets; numerous comets, asteroids, and
meteoroids; and the interplanetary medium. The Sun is the richest source of
electromagnetic energy (mostly in the form of heat and light) in the solar
system. The Sun's nearest known stellar neighbor is a red dwarf star called Proxima Centauri, at a distance of 4.3
light years away. The
whole solar system, together with the local stars visible on a clear night,
orbits the center of our home galaxy, a spiral disk of 200 billion stars we
call the Milky Way.
The Milky Way has two small galaxies orbiting
it nearby, which are visible from the southern hemisphere. They are called the
Large Magellanic Cloud and the Small Magellanic Cloud. The nearest large galaxy
is the Andromeda Galaxy. It is a spiral galaxy like the Milky Way but is 4
times as massive and is 2 million light years away. Our galaxy, one of billions
of galaxies known, is traveling through intergalactic space.
What is
Intergalactic Space? ¹
The space between stars is known as interstellar space, and
the space between galaxies is called intergalactic space. These are the vast
empty spaces that exist between galaxies. For example, if we wanted to travel
from the Milky Way to the Andromeda galaxy, we would need to cross 2.5 million
light-years of intergalactic space.
Intergalactic space is as close as one can get to an
absolute vacuum. There’s very little dust and debris, and scientists have
calculated that there’s probably only one hydrogen atom per cubic meter. The
density of material is higher near galaxies, and lower in the midpoint between
galaxies. Galaxies
are connected by rarefied plasma that is thought to possess a cosmic
filamentary structure, which is slightly denser than the average density of the
Universe. This material is known as the intergalactic medium, and it’s mostly
made up of ionized hydrogen. Astronomers think that the intergalactic medium is
about 10 to 100 times denser than the average density of the Universe.
Interstellar Travel – The possibilities ²
The term “moonshot” is sometimes invoked to
denote a project so outrageously ambitious that it can only be described by
comparing it to the Apollo 11 mission that landed the first human on the Moon.
The breakthrough “Starshot Initiative” transcends
the moonshot descriptor because its purpose goes far beyond the Moon. The aptly-named
project seeks to travel to the nearest stars.
The brainchild
of Russian-born tech entrepreneur billionaire Yuri Milner, Breakthrough
Starshot was announced in April 2016 at a press conference joined by renowned
physicists including Stephen Hawking and Freeman Dyson. While still early, its
current vision is that thousands of wafer-sized chips attached to large, silver
lightsails will be placed into Earth orbit and accelerated by the pressure of
an intense Earth-based laser hitting the lightsail. After just two minutes of
being driven by the laser, the spacecraft will be traveling at one-fifth the
speed of light—a thousand times faster than any macroscopic object has ever
achieved.
Each craft
will coast for 20 years and collect scientific data about interstellar space.
Upon reaching the planets near the Alpha Centauri star
system, the onboard digital camera will take high-resolution pictures and
send these back to Earth, providing the first glimpse of our closest planetary
neighbors. In addition to scientific knowledge, we may learn whether these
planets are suitable for human colonization. While this endeavor may sound like
science fiction, there are no known scientific obstacles to implementing it. However,
for Starshot to be successful, a number of advances in technologies are
necessary. The organizers and advising scientists are relying upon the
exponential rate of advancement to make Starshot happen within 20 years.
Objective: Exoplanet Detection
An exoplanet is a planet
outside our Solar System. While the first scientific detection of an exoplanet
was in 1988; as of May 2017 there have been 3,608 confirmed detections of
exoplanets in 2,702 planetary systems. While some resemble those in our Solar
System, many have fascinating and bizarre features, such as rings 200 times
wider than Saturn’s.
Advances
in Telescope Technology
Just 100 years ago the world’s
largest telescope was the Hooker Telescope at 2.54 meters. Today, the European
Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope consists of four large 8.2-meter
diameter telescopes and is now the most productive ground-based facility in
astronomy.
In May 2016, researchers using
the Transiting Planets and Planetesimals Small Telescope (TRAPPIST) in Chile
found not just one but seven Earth-sized exoplanets in the
habitable zone. NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has revealed the first known
system of seven Earth-size planets around a single star. Three of these planets
are firmly located in the habitable zone, the area around the parent star where
a rocky planet is most likely to have liquid water. This discovery sets a new
record for greatest number of habitable-zone planets found around a single star
outside our solar system. All of these seven planets could have liquid water –
key to life as we know it – under the right atmospheric conditions, but the
chances are highest with the three in the habitable zone.
At about 40 light-years (235
trillion miles) from Earth, the system of planets is relatively close to us, in
the constellation Aquarius.
Using Spitzer data, the team
precisely measured the sizes of the seven planets and developed first estimates
of the masses of six of them, allowing their density to be estimated. Based on
their densities, all of the TRAPPIST-1 planets are likely to be rocky. Further
observations will not only help determine whether they are rich in water, but
also possibly reveal whether any could have liquid water on their surfaces. The
mass of the seventh and farthest exoplanet has not yet been estimated –
scientists believe it could be an icy, "snowball-like" world, but
further observations are needed.
Spitzer, Hubble, and Kepler
will help astronomers plan for follow-up studies using NASA's upcoming James
Webb Space Telescope, launching in 2018. With much greater sensitivity, Webb
will be able to detect the chemical fingerprints of water, methane, oxygen,
ozone, and other components of a planet's atmosphere. Webb also will analyze
planets' temperatures and surface pressures – key factors in assessing their
habitability.
The Starchip – a prelude to the Starship
Each 15-millimeter-wide
Starchip will necessarily contain a vast array of sophisticated electronic devices,
such as a navigation system, camera, communication laser, radioisotope battery,
camera multiplexer, and camera interface. The expectation is that humankind
will be able to compress an entire spaceship onto a small wafer is based on the
exponentially decreasing sensor and chip sizes. The first computer chips in the
1960s contained a handful of transistors. Today, technology can squeeze
billions of transistors onto each chip. The first digital camera weighed 8
pounds and took 0.01 megapixel images. Today, a digital camera sensor yields
high-quality 12+ megapixel color images and fits in a smartphone—along with
other sensors like GPS, accelerometer, and gyroscope. And we are seeing this
improvements being used in space exploration with the advent of smaller
satellites that are providing better data.
For Starshot to succeed, technological
advances must allow the chip’s mass to be about 0.22 grams by the year 2030, and
based on the current rate of technical improvements, projections suggest this
is entirely possible.
The Lightsail driving the Starchip
The sail must be made of a
material which is highly reflective (to gain maximum momentum from the laser),
minimally absorbing (so that it is not incinerated from the heat), and also
very light weight (allowing quick acceleration). These three criteria
are extremely constrictive and there is at present no satisfactory
material that has been designed. The required advances may come from
artificial intelligence automating and accelerating materials discovery. Such
automation has advanced to the point where machine learning techniques can
“generate libraries of candidate materials by the tens of thousands,” allowing
engineers to identify which ones are worth pursuing and testing for specific
applications.
Energy Storage on board Starchip
While the Starchip will use a
tiny nuclear-powered radioisotope battery for its 24-year-plus journey, it will
still need conventional chemical batteries for the lasers. The lasers will need
to employ tremendous energy in a short span of time, meaning that the power
must be stored in nearby batteries. Battery storage has improved at 5-8% per
year, though we often don’t notice this benefit because appliance power
consumption has increased at a comparable rate resulting in a steady operating
lifetime. If batteries continue to improve at this rate, in 20 years they
should have 3 to 5 times their present capacity.
Harnessing Lasers’ Power
Thousands of high-powered
lasers will be used to push the lightsail to extraordinary speeds. In the last
decade there has been a dramatic acceleration in power scaling of diode and
fiber lasers, the former breaking through 10 kilowatts from a single mode fiber
in 2010 and the 100-kilowatt barrier a few months later. In addition to the raw
power, advances in combining phased array lasers, will be necessary.
The Need for Speed
It was in 1804 that the train
was invented and soon thereafter produced the never before unheard speed of 70
mph. The Helios 2 spacecraft eclipsed this record in 1976: at it’s fastest, it
was moving away from Earth at a speed of 356,040 km/h. Just 40 years later the
New Horizons spacecraft achieved a heliocentric speed of almost 45 km/s or
100,000 miles per hour. Yet even at these speeds it would take a long, long
time to reach Alpha Centauri at slightly more than four light years away. Accelerating
subatomic particles to nearly light speed is routine in particle accelerators,
never before has this been achieved for macroscopic objects. Achieving 20%
speed of light for Starshot would represent a 1000x speed increase for any
human-built object.
Memory and its Storage
Fundamental to computing is the
ability to store information. Starshot depends on the continued decreasing cost
and size of digital memory to include sufficient storage for its programs and
the images taken of Alpha Centauri star system and its planets.
The cost of memory has also decreased
exponentially for decades: in 1970, a megabyte cost about one million dollars;
it’s now about one-tenth of a cent. The size required for the storage has
similarly decreased, from a 5-megabyte hard drive being loaded via forklift in
1956 to the current availability of 512-gigabyte USB sticks weighing a few
grams.
Telecommunication with Earth Control
Once the images are taken;
Starchip(s) will need to send the images back to Earth for processing. Telecommunications
has advanced rapidly since Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone in
1876. The average internet speed in the US is currently about 11 megabits per
second. The bandwidth and speed required for Starshot to send digital images
over 4 light years—or 20 trillion miles—will require taking advantage in the
latest telecommunications technology. One promising technology is Li-Fi, a
wireless approach which is 100 times faster than Wi-Fi. A second is via
optical fibers which now boast 1.125 terabits per second. There are even
efforts in quantum telecommunications which are not just ultrafast but
completely secure.
Computing the Data
The final step in the Starshot
project is to analyze the data returning from the spacecraft. To do so we must
take advantage of the exponential increase in computing power, benefiting from
the trillion-fold increase in computing over the 60 years. This dramatically
decreasing cost of computing has now continued due largely to the presence of
cloud computing. Extrapolating into the future and taking advantage of new
types of processing, such as quantum computing, we should see another
thousand-fold increase in power by the time data from Starshot returns. Such extreme
processing power will allow us to perform sophisticated scientific modeling and
analysis of our nearest neighboring star system.
Interstellar
Travel – Why it’s not as easy as Science Fiction ³
Almost 50 years ago, humans
were walking on the moon. But we stopped going in 1972 and never ventured any
farther, except by sending robotic probes. What is it that makes travel far
away so difficult? Besides the obvious human health concerns (living in
microgravity tends to weaken a body over time) and budgetary issues, there are
vast technological problems with traveling to faraway places.
Accelerating a spacecraft with
pure energy would take a lot of propulsion, not to mention that you would
eventually run into a speed limit. According to Albert Einstein's general
theory of relativity postulated a century ago, “as any object approaches the
speed of light, its mass reaches infinity”. So, in other words, a spacecraft
couldn't physically go as fast as light.
And whether humans travel near
the speed of light or use other methods, they would likely run into the
phenomenon of time dilation .
As a spacecraft moves at speeds approaching that of light, occupants would age
at a slower rate than their friends and family back home, Einstein's theory of
special relativity shows. So, people on a long voyage may return to find their
loved ones greatly aged, or dead.
Interstellar travel is still
possible, but as far as we know, the best option is to think fairly local for
now. The nearest star system to us is Alpha Centauri that is close enough to be
intriguing: just about four years away if you travel at the speed of light. But
at slower speeds, it's still pretty far. If the Voyager 2 spacecraft (which
launched in 1977 and breached interstellar space in 2012) had gone in that
direction, it wouldn't reach Alpha Centauri for another 75,000 years.
Whenever humanity does figure
out how to voyage far into interstellar space, we will get benefits and new
insights, even with a (relatively) short trip to Alpha Centauri. First of all, interstellar
travel would provide a bit of a backup for humanity. In case our own solar
system ended up inhabitable; we could theoretically voyage to another world and
continue living there. Additionally, scientists would be glad to study the
interstellar medium (the gas and dust that lie in between stars), and of
course, the astro-biological studies. As far as we know, we are the only life
in the universe, but the idea that there could be life on other worlds is
certainly quite tantalizing, and interesting.
“A strategy that goes all the way out into the stars”
The US Air Force Space Command recently released a white
paper titled “Resiliency and
Disaggregated Space Architectures”. It breaks down the needs and
wants of the future of space command program, within the limits that today’s
environment allows. The security environment of today, as the paper says, is
much different than in the past. Satellites used to be the biggest and
flashiest things they could roll onto the launch pad. Performance was prioritized
over protection as the threat of “mutually assured destruction”
reduced any risk of an attack. Then technology evolved.
System designs became increasingly complex, integrated and
expensive. With the ambitions of a foregone era, but not the budget, the
need for advancement in space technologies for security and communication
purposes still exists. A answer to this has been proposed: “disaggregation”-
A concept that might be able to bridge the gap between innovation and
affordability.
According to the white paper, “Disaggregation improves
mission survivability by increasing the number and diversity of potential
targets, thereby complicating an adversary’s decision calculus and increasing
the uncertainty of successful attack.” In slightly less complicated terms, they
want to break up the space mission technology and efforts onto multiple
platforms or systems.
Disaggregation is of value whether the threat is a hostile
adversary, or an environmental threat, such as orbital debris. Instead of
sending one behemoth into the stratosphere, they want to create a lot of
simpler, more effective systems and technologies. These smaller platforms
are designed to do the same thing as the big mission, but in a more
network-integrated way.
“The space systems that met yesterday’s challenges
must address today’s problems, and today’s architectures must address the
future security environment”.
While kinetic threats could obviously be devastating,
non-kinetic threats, such as radio-frequency jammers and cyber attacks, can be
equally destructive and are far more prevalent. Cyberspace threats, in
particular, have exceptionally low barriers to entry and are growing rapidly.
Space systems that rely on complex software and radio-frequency links could be
susceptible to these attacks, despite robust cryptographic protection. Given
the challenges of a rapidly changing security and fiscal environment, seeking
resilience in space systems is of a benefit to the security of the nation. Disaggregating
space architectures is one strategy to improve resiliency, offering a means to
trade cost, schedule, performance, and risk to increase flexibility and
capability survivability.
Disaggregation is “the dispersion of space-based missions, functions or sensors across multiple systems
spanning one or more orbital plane, platform, host or domain. It is a strategy
to affect multiple elements of overall space architecture and its purpose is to
provide options within architecture to drive down cost, increase resiliency and
distribute capability. Disaggregation has other benefits. It allows systems to
be less complex, easier to maintain and affords the Air Force the ability to
lower per-unit production costs and improve industrial base stability.
Increased Technology Refresh Opportunities
Current satellite systems have developmental timelines of up
to 14 years. Once on orbit these systems routinely exceed 10 years of
life. Through less complex satellites employing more flexible designs,
disaggregation facilitates the incorporation of new technology before the end
of a space constellation’s lifetime. In this regard, it represents an evolution
of system acquisition that enables adaptable platforms, software, and
capabilities to more effectively match emerging needs.
Increased Launch and Space Industrial Base Stability
Disaggregation could also foster healthy competition and
assist with distributing workload over multiple contractors. Payloads flown on
separate spacecraft groups could be provided by different contractor teams,
potentially dividing large contracts, creating industrial competition and
allowing technology insertion on independent timelines.
“Depending on the approach to disaggregation employed, it
could lead to more frequent and predictable launch profiles.”
Improved Deterrence
If, as many experts assert, an attack in space is
inevitable, keeping things running from many locations has benefits.
Disaggregation will enable new tactics,
techniques and procedures (TTPs) to take advantage of the unique attributes
of a dispersed architecture. Basically, there’s something to be said
about not putting all your technology eggs into one satellite/facility basket.
If the premise is accepted that national security space
assets will someday be attacked, then it’s paramount to have a military and
moral obligation, to examine protective measures that minimize this risk and
protect our nation’s war-fighters, citizens, and economy. While disaggregation
is only part of the equation for space system resiliency, it offers the
possibility to increase technology refresh opportunities, improve requirements
discipline, increase launch and space industrial base stability, increase
affordability and improve deterrence.
POWERING
SPACE TRAVEL
The US Department of Energy
(DOE) and its predecessors have provided radioisotope power systems that have
safely enabled deep space exploration and national security missions for five
decades.
Radioisotope
power systems (RPSs)
convert the heat from the decay of the radioactive isotope plutonium-238
(Pu-238) into electricity. RPSs are capable of producing heat and electricity
under the harsh conditions encountered in deep space for decades. They have
proven safe, reliable, and maintenance-free in missions to study the moon and
all of the planets in the solar system except Mercury. The RPS-powered New
Horizons spacecraft transited the Pluto system on 14 July 2015, and will
continue on to explore other objects in the Kuiper6
belt.
DOE maintains the
infrastructure to develop, manufacture, test, analyze, and deliver RPSs for
space exploration and national security missions. DOE provides two general
types of systems – power systems that provide electricity, such as radioisotope
thermoelectric generators (RTGs), and small heat sources called radioisotope
heater units (RHUs) that keep spacecraft components warm in harsh environments.
DOE also maintains responsibility for nuclear safety throughout all aspects of
the missions and performs a detailed analysis in support of those missions.
SPACE AND DEFENSE INFRASTRUCTURE
Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators
(RTGs) —
The RTG systems are ideal for applications where solar panels cannot supply
adequate power, such as for spacecraft surveying planets far from the sun. RTGs
have been used on many National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
missions, including the following.
Mars Science Laboratory
Mission, Curiosity Rover
The Mars Science Laboratory
rover, named Curiosity, launched on November 26, 2011, and landed successfully
on Mars on August 5, 2012. It is the first NASA mission to use the Multi-Mission
Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator (MMRTG). Curiosity is collecting Martian
soil samples and rock cores, and is analyzing them for organic compounds and
environmental conditions that could have supported microbial life now or in the
past. Curiosity is the fourth and the largest, most capable rover ever sent to
study a planet other than Earth.
The New Horizons spacecraft was
launched on January 19, 2006. The fastest spacecraft to ever leave Earth, New
Horizons has returned images and scientific data from Jupiter and will continue
its journey of three billion miles to study Pluto and its moon, Charon, in 2015.
It may also go on to study one or more objects in the vast Kuiper Belt, the
largest structure in our planetary system.
Cassini Mission Orbiting Saturn
In July 2004, the Cassini
mission entered the orbit of Saturn. Launched in October 1997, the Cassini spacecraft
uses three DOE-supplied RTGs and is the largest spacecraft ever launched to
explore the outer planets. It is successfully returning data and images of
Saturn and its surrounding moons, using a broad range of scientific
instruments. This mission requires RTGs because of the long distance from the
sun, which makes the use of solar arrays impractical. The RTGs have allowed the
mission to be extended twice; the mission is expected to last at least until
2017.
Voyager Mission to Jupiter,
Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and the Edge of the Solar System
In the summer of 1977, Voyager
1 and 2 left Earth and began their grand tour of the outer planets. Both
spacecraft use two RTGs supplied by DOE to generate electricity. In 1979, the
spacecraft passed by Jupiter; in 1981, it passed by Saturn. Voyager 2 was the
first spacecraft to encounter Uranus (1986) and Neptune (1989). Voyager 1
is currently exploring interstellar space. Voyager 2 is slightly closer to the
sun and is currently exploring the heliosheath on the boundary of interstellar
space. Voyager 1 is presently the farthest human-made object from Earth, and
currently more than 11 billion miles from earth. Both spacecraft remain
operational and are sending back useful scientific data after over 35 years of
operation. The RTGs are expected to continue producing enough power for
spacecraft operations through 2025, 47 years after launch.
Radioisotope Heater Units
(RHUs) —
RHUs use the heat generated by Pu-238 to keep a spacecraft’s instruments within
their designed operating temperatures.
In June and July 2003, NASA
launched the Mars exploration rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, to explore
evidence of water on Mars. Each rover has eight RHUs to keep the rover
instruments warm during the cold Martian nights. The rovers landed at separate
sites on Mars in January 2004 on a planned 90-day mission. Spirit roved the
surface of Mars for over 6 years until it became stuck in a sand trap.
Opportunity is still exploring the Martian surface and transmitting data after
7 years of operation. NASA has also identified several new missions potentially
requiring RHUs.
It is not yet 60 years since
the first artificial satellite was placed into Earth orbit. In just over a half
century, mankind has gone from no presence in outer space to a condition of
high dependence on orbiting satellites. These sensors, receivers, transmitters,
and other such devices, as well as the satellites that carry them, are
components of complex space systems that include terrestrial elements,
electronic links between and among components, organizations to provide the
management, care and feeding, and launch systems that put satellites into
orbit. In many instances, these space systems connect with and otherwise
interact with terrestrial systems; for example, a very long list of Earth-based
systems cannot function properly without information from the Global
Positioning System (GPS).
Space systems are fundamental
to the information business, and the modern world is an information-driven one.
In addition to navigation (and associated timing), space systems provide
communications and imagery and other Earth-sensing functions. Among these
systems are many that support military, intelligence, and other national
security functions of the United States and many other nations. Some of these
are unique government, national security systems; however, functions to support
national security are also provided by commercial and civil-government space
systems.
The importance of space systems
to any country and its allies; and potential adversaries raises major policy
issues. National Security Space Defense and Protection reviews the range
of options available to address threats to space systems, in terms of deterring
hostile actions, defeating hostile actions, surviving hostile actions, and
assesses potential strategies and plans to counter such threats. It recommends
architectures, capabilities, and courses of action to address threats and
actions to address affordability, technology risk, and other potential barriers
or limiting factors in implementing future courses of action.
Space: The Final Frontier 7
Human beings are natural
explorers. Our curiosities and our desires to build and tame that which is outside of us, is
obvious; sometimes painfully so. It is equally clear to notice the patterns of
our introspective journeys. There are points in time, however, when a
technological paradigm shift occurs. And so, much like how space and time are a
continuum in the scientific discipline of astrophysics, space and time are also
interdependent in the design discipline.
The distance
of time between the first commercial electronic telegraph and the announcement
of the first iPhone was 170 years. That time-span is nothing compared to the
time-span that modern-day humans have been around. It’s only .09%
actually– not even a tenth of one percent of our time. And now, ten years
later, we face the frontiers of functioning virtual reality and augmented
reality. We are getting better, at a faster rate.
Humans are pretty ingenious. We
are on the breakthrough of a new technology called “Quantum Computing”, that
IBM now has a functioning quantum computer hooked up to the internet for
computer scientists to experiment with. Quantum computing is widely seen as an
evolution of computer technology, which may allow for much faster calculations
than today's machines. Traditional computers process all their information
using bits - information stored in tiny transistors that can either be on or
off - interpreted as values of one and zero. Quantum computing instead takes
advantage of a mechanic called super-positioning that allows quantum bits - or
"qubits" - to have values
of one, zero, or both at the same time.
Researchers believe this core
difference will eventually lead to powerful devices with processing power that
will exceed the limits of classic computers. While this technology is far from
being a replacement for our laptops, it is our salvation from the limitations
we begin to face with current and near future computing power. With the proper
steam to move our tech forward and the emerging spaces of design becoming more
within our reach, more useful, more ubiquitous with our daily tasks and the
commonplace objects we interact with, the time has come for a new paradigm
shift. This will not merely be a shift in our tools; it will literally be a
shift in our world.
4th Dimensional Design
4th Dimensional Design could be defined as the thoughtful
consideration of, and construction of, a world rooted outside the confines of
natural laws, yet existing primarily to function within the natural world. It has
two requirements:
- The ability for humans to build objects and/or interfaces that could not be built solely using materials or methods found in nature.
- An understanding of the implications and purpose of the construction of such objects and/or interfaces and a method by which to govern and institute these understandings toward the betterment of society.
Designers and
technologists are the new stewards. We have a responsibility to design a better
world. With emerging design spaces and the arriving quantum computing
technology to power these spaces, we’ll have the ability to shape the future.
4th
Dimensional Design is an opportunity for us to take control of the reins of our
destiny.
Over the past century humankind
has managed to do the impossible and rein in famine, plague, and war. This may
seem hard to accept, but, the reality is that famine, plague and war have been
transformed from incomprehensible and uncontrollable forces of nature into
manageable challenges. For the first time ever, more people die from eating too
much than from eating too little; more people die from old age than from
infectious diseases; and more people commit suicide than are killed by
soldiers, terrorists and criminals put together.
What then; will replace famine,
plague, and war at the top of the human agenda? As the self-made gods of planet
earth, what destinies will we set ourselves, and which quests will we
undertake? Homo Deus8 explores
the projects, dreams and nightmares that will shape the twenty-first
century—from overcoming death to creating artificial life. It asks the
fundamental questions: Where do we go from here? And how will we protect this
fragile world from our own destructive powers? This is the next stage of
evolution.
Colonizing Space:
Exploration is one of
humanity’s greatest drivers. We’ve moved around the planet and into almost
every environment—mountains, deserts, jungles, and swamps. But will we be able
to take the next step and adapt ourselves to life beyond the planet? If so,
where in space is most habitable for humans?
It’s
been almost half a century since man first set foot on the moon. But the recent
advances in the areas of propulsion, computers, medical technology and
artificial intelligence have created opportunities to design various types of
vehicles for interstellar travel. However, the crucial question would be to
ask, which entity would spear-head this progress; nations or private
entrepreneurs? The investment of nations will always be determined by prestige
projects as fickle as public opinion, and the limited lobbying of science
special interests. None of this will likely ever be enough for major endeavors.
The interest of entrepreneurs however is a totally different
story. Many entrepreneurs are interested solely in profit, others use profit as
a tool for their dreams. Space colonization will be pioneered by the later and
ultimately funded by the former. Once any human activity in outer space is
found to be profitable without government subsidy, human presence in outer
space will explode very rapidly.
The
single overriding factor for anything to happen with regard to human
colonization of space is launch costs. What has been achieved thus far has been
achieved despite ridiculously huge costs to put payloads into space. Till now
only robot satellites have been profitable and space is teaming with privately
funded satellites as a result. If launch costs can come down enough however, a
great many other activities, human activities, will become profitable. Chief
among these will be asteroid (and possibly moon) mining and micro-gravity
manufacturing, both of which will require a human element to manage
intricacies.
SpaceX
has successfully soft landed first stage boosters, commercial boosters that
actually put a paid payload into orbit, something many space experts said was
impossible. Recently, they have re-launched such boosters! This is a huge step
towards space colonization, every bit as huge as delivering Voyager-1 to the
outer limits of our galaxy and into interstellar space in 2012. Being able to
recover and reuse launch rockets will ultimately reduce the cost of access to
space so much, that regular human launches will become completely routine. We
will soon (likely within the next decade) see the first privately funded pilot
projects in space based manufacturing and asteroid harvesting.
Elon
Musk (the owner and CEO of SpaceX) has a personal goal of colonizing Mars. His
plan is simply to come up with a completely reusable transportation mechanism
that can move people to Mars by the hundreds, and by virtue of it being
reusable, sell tickets to Mars for a price that wealthy individuals can
privately afford. He
has done his own market research and found that his plan is in fact viable;
only if he can get the ticket costs low enough to ensure that there is enough
demand. Sadly that existing demand exists to a large degree on people's dreams
of adventure, and it’s anybody’s guess whether dreams will surpass
reality.
DESTINATION MARS – MAKING IT HABITABLE
The idea of terra-forming Mars –
aka "Earth's Twin" – is a fascinating idea. Between melting the polar
ice caps, slowly creating an atmosphere, and then engineering the environment
to have foliage, rivers, and standing bodies of water, there's enough there to
inspire many scientific adventurers. But just how long would such an endeavor
take; what would it cost us, and is it really an effective use of our time and
energy?
Such were the questions dealt with by two papers presented at NASA's "Planetary Science Vision 2050 Workshop" in Mar 2017. The first, titled "The Terraforming Timeline", presents an abstract plan for turning the Red Planet into something green and habitable. The second, titled "Mars Terraforming – the Wrong Way", rejects the idea of terraforming altogether and presents an alternative.
The former paper was produced by Aaron Berliner from the University of California, Berkeley, and Chris McKay from the Space Sciences Division at NASA Ames Research Center. In their paper, the two researchers present a timeline for the terraforming of Mars that includes a Warming Phase and an Oxygenation Phase, as well as all the necessary steps that would precede and follow.
Such were the questions dealt with by two papers presented at NASA's "Planetary Science Vision 2050 Workshop" in Mar 2017. The first, titled "The Terraforming Timeline", presents an abstract plan for turning the Red Planet into something green and habitable. The second, titled "Mars Terraforming – the Wrong Way", rejects the idea of terraforming altogether and presents an alternative.
The former paper was produced by Aaron Berliner from the University of California, Berkeley, and Chris McKay from the Space Sciences Division at NASA Ames Research Center. In their paper, the two researchers present a timeline for the terraforming of Mars that includes a Warming Phase and an Oxygenation Phase, as well as all the necessary steps that would precede and follow.
As they state in their paper's Introduction:
"Terraforming
Mars can be divided into two phases. The first phase is warming the planet from
the present average surface temperature of -60° C to a value close to Earth's
average temperature to +15° C, and recreating a thick CO² atmosphere. This
warming phase is relatively easy and quick, and could take ~100 years. The
second phase is producing levels of O² in the atmosphere that would allow
humans and other large mammals to breathe normally. This oxygenation phase is
relatively difficult and would take 100,000 years or more, unless one
postulates a technological breakthrough."
Before these can begin, Berliner and McKay acknowledge that
certain "pre-terraforming" steps need to be taken. These include
investigating Mars' environment to determine the levels of water on the
surface, the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and in ice form in the
Polar Regions, and the amount of nitrates in Martian soil. As they explain, all
of these are keys to the practicality of making a biosphere on Mars. Till date,
the available evidence points towards all three elements existing in abundance
on Mars. While most of Mars water is currently in the form of ice in the polar
regions and polar caps, there is enough there to support a water cycle –
complete with clouds, rain, rivers and lakes. Meanwhile, some estimates claim
that there is enough CO² in ice form in the Polar Regions to create an
atmosphere equal to the sea level pressure on Earth.
To this, Valeriy Yakovlev – an astrophysicist and hydrogeologist from Laboratory of Water Quality in Kharkov, Ukraine – offers a dissenting view. In his paper, "Mars Terraforming – the Wrong Way", he makes the case for the creation of space biospheres in Low Earth Orbit that would rely on artificial gravity (like an O'Neill Cylinder) to allow humans to grow accustomed to life in space. Looking to one of the biggest challenges of space colonization, Yakovlev points to how life on bodies like the Moon or Mars could be dangerous for human settlers. In addition to being vulnerable to solar and cosmic radiation, colonists would have to deal with substantially lower gravity. In the case of the Moon, this would be roughly 0.165 times that which humans experience here on Earth (aka. 1 g), whereas on Mars it would be roughly 0.376 times.
In addition, he points to the challenges of creating the
ideal environment for individuals living in space. Beyond simply creating
better vehicles and developing the means to procure the necessary resources,
there is also the need to create the ideal space environment for families.
Essentially, this requires the development of housing that is optimal in terms
of size, stability, and comfort. In light of this, Yakolev presents what he
considers to be the most likely prospects for humanity's exit to space between
now and 2030. This will include the creation of the first space biospheres with
artificial gravity, which will lead to key developments in terms of materials
technology, life support-systems, and the robotic systems and infrastructure
needed to install and service habitats in Low Earth Orbit (LEO).
These habitats could be serviced thanks to the creation of
robotic spacecraft that could harvest resources from nearby bodies – such as
the Moon and Near-Earth Objects (NEOs). This concept would not only remove the
need for planetary protections – i.e. worries about contaminating Mars'
biosphere (assuming the presence of bacterial life), it would also allow human
beings to become accustomed to space more gradually. And with space habitats in
place, some very crucial research could begin, including medical and biologic
research which would involve the first children born in space. It would also
facilitate the development of reliable space shuttles and resource extraction
technologies, which will come in handy for the settlement of other bodies –
like the Moon, Mars, and even exoplanets.
Ultimately, Yakolev thinks that space biospheres could also
be accomplished within a reasonable timeframe – i.e. between 2030 and 2050 –
which is simply not possible with terraforming. Citing the growing presence and
power of the commercial space sector, Yakolev also believed a lot of the
infrastructure that is necessary is already in place (or under development). With
NASA scientists and entrepreneurs like Elon Musk and Bas Landorp looking to
colonize Mars in the near future, and other commercial aerospace companies
developing LEO, the size and shape of humanity's future in space is difficult
to predict. Perhaps we will jointly decide on a path that takes us to the Moon,
Mars, and beyond. Perhaps we will see our best efforts directed into near-Earth
space.
Or perhaps we will see ourselves going off in multiple
directions at once. Whereas some groups will advocate creating space habitats
in LEO (and later, elsewhere in the Solar System) that rely on artificial
gravity and robotic spaceships mining asteroids for materials, others will
focus on establishing outposts on planetary bodies, with the goal of turning
them into "new Earths". Between them, we can expect that humans will
begin developing a degree of "space expertise" in this century, which
will certainly come in handy when we start pushing the boundaries of
exploration and colonization even further. However, any permanent Mars habitat
will be largely the domain of scientists, tourists and super-wealthy retirees. The
problem with Mars is that there is nothing to do there (other than science and
tourism) that cannot be done more profitably elsewhere, and therein lies the
crux. This is not the death knell for space colonization; it will only require
that Elon Musk have his transportation system with destinations other than
Mars. Chief among these may be Ceres.11
Ceres is a dwarf planet in the asteroid belt, much easier to land on
actually than Mars. It has just enough gravity that things parked near to it
won't float away, but so little that sending material from Ceres to anywhere
else in the solar system will be extremely inexpensive relative to the cost of
getting stuff out of planetary gravity wells. It also has an extremely large
supply of water, along with every other element we could possibly want. It is
located in the asteroid belt so it could be home base for other asteroid mining
activity as well. A colony on Ceres could be
profitable; with the ability to supply oxygen, water, rocket fuel, building
materials, etc., to any and all space projects, most especially including
microgravity manufacturing factories operated by space colonists, making
products profitably for sale on Earth and elsewhere.
Within
the lifetimes of most people reading this, the human race will have a permanent,
self sustaining human presence on a secondary planet away from Earth. That
presence will continue to grow. It is very probable that the growth in human
population will be such that building O'Niell12 colonies will be necessary
and profitable, again within the lifetimes of people reading this.
There is a fifth dimension beyond that which is
known to man. It is a dimension as vast as space and as timeless as infinity.
It is the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and
superstition, and it lies between the pit of man’s fears and the summit of his
knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area we call the
Twilight Zone.
References:
[1] Fraser Crain: ‘What is Intergalactic
Space?”
[2] Mark
Jackson, Pete Worden and Gregg Maryniak: “Interstellar
Travel would be possible sooner than you think”
[3] Engage Warp Drive! Why Interstellar Travel's Harder Than It Looks”
[4] Time Dilation: “a slowing of time in accordance with the theory of relativity that occurs in a system in motion relative to an outside observer and that becomes apparent especially as the speed of the system approaches that of light”.
[5] United
States Air-force Command: “The future of
Space Architecture”.
[6] Kuiper
Belt: The
Kuiper Belt is a region of space. It is a doughnut-shaped ring of icy objects
around the Sun, extending just
beyond the orbit of Neptune from about 30 to 55 AU (astronomical units) compared
to Earth which is one astronomical
unit, or AU, from the Sun.
[7] Steven Paul Winkelstein: “Space, Time, & Quantum Leaps”
[8] Yuval Noah Harari: Author of “Homo
Deus”
[9] Peter Cohen: “How Will Humans
Colonize Space in the Years Ahead?”
[10] Matt Williams: ‘Terraforming Mars”
[11] Ceres: A Ceres colony would build a
rotating torus inside the planetoid to create an artificial gravity for its inhabitants. This would be quite easy as the
microgravity would create little structural stress. The mass above the torus would have relatively
negligible weight requiring only minimal support. That mass would shield the inhabitants from the hazards
of the space environment every bit as well as does Earth's atmosphere.
[12] O’Niell Colony: Also called the O’Niell
cylinder is a space settlement design proposed by American physicist Gerald K. O’Neill in
his 1976 book ‘The High Frontier: Human
Colonies in Space”.
