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Harvard University scientists have called a new way to achieve the speed of light on interstellar spaceships. To do this, you can use energy from supernovae, researchers say. About it reports the publication Science Alert.
Spaceships can use blast energy with solar or magnetic sails that capture electromagnetic energy from a star, which creates pressure and traction, is not requiring fuel. Another possibility is to accelerate such ships using a directional laser beam and thus achieving higher speeds than the sun allows radiation.
According to astrophysicists, if you place a spaceship with a sail that weighs less than half a gram per square meter, per a million kilometers from a star about to explode as a supernova, then relativistic speeds can be achieved, i.e. get closer to the speed of light. Energy and brightness generated supernova equivalent to what produces a billion suns in within a month. The solar wind can propel the solar sail to one thousandth of the speed of light, and a supernova up to one tenth.
Scientists also appreciated how sail can be accelerated with other astrophysical objects: massive stars, microquasars, pleurions (pulsars surrounded by the nebula) and active galactic kernels by developing appropriate mathematical models.
Although using intense radiation it is possible to achieve near light speeds, there are a number of problems. For instance, massive stars generate gas flows that will create a dangerous friction force for a sail. The sails themselves should be made of high reflective material, capable of folding. Trajectory must be thought out in advance to avoid collision with solid particles. However, scientists believe that theoretically these difficulties are surmountable.
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