Showing posts with label Interstellar spacecraft. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Interstellar spacecraft. Show all posts

Tuesday, April 5, 2022

Cryogenics and interstellar travel are things that might be true someday in the future.



The image above this text is from the movie "Aliens". That thing shows the artist's vision of the cryostatic capsules that allow interstellar flight. There are made many visions about the systems that could make the hypothetical interstellar flight possible. When we are thinking about the possibility to use cloned crews that are dying during the mission. 

We must remember the cultural aspect of that thing. For us, the cloned bodies and the transfer of the mind between those bodies is a strange idea. There is the possibility that the culture of tomorrow is making that kind of immortality possible. When the crew members would die. Computers will transfer memories to the brains of the next body. Advanced biotechnology is making that kind of thing possible. 

When we are thinking about the interstellar flight with the cryogenically frozen crew that mission will not be "quite so difficult", as we might think. The idea of cryogenics is to stabilize the DNA of the crew members and deny their aging process. The cryogenic system will use liquid helium in that process and when the craft is near its target. The system starts to warm the bodies of the crew members. Returning the vital signs is a long-term process. And during cryogenic sleep, there are no chemical or other processes in the bodies of the crew. 

If something unexpected will happen. The system might warm the crew members to a temperature that their nervous systems will start to work. The computer can use BCI (Brain-Computer Interface) for communicating between the crew and its systems. That thing can allow the sleeping crew members can control the computer. Without the need to wake up. 

The cryogenics must not be stable. When the craft sees something unexpected it can streamline the cryogenic sleep to normal hypothermic anesthesia or hibernation. That allows the craft to react to danger. But when the problem is solved. The crew member will freeze in cryogenic conditions. 

That system can also switch the memory of the crew member off. If it uses advanced biotechnology. There is the possibility that the body of the sleeping crew is injected with genetically engineered macrophages that are removing neurotransmitters that store things to long-term memory. During that time the system stores those memories on hard disks. And that means there is nothing that can store in the personal memory of the crew of the hypothetical spacecraft. 

The fact is that the hypothetical spacecraft would not need very much computer power while it travels in interstellar space. The only thing that this system requires is the knowledge of how to keep its course. If the system requires more calculating- or productive thinking it can wake up a couple of crew members. Or the system can only remove the cryogenic sleep and transfer to use the normal hypothermic sleep. That allows the computers of the spacecraft can start to communicate with the nervous system of the sleeping crew. 

The BCI system can be in the cryogenic chamber of the crew. But those systems would be needed only at the end of the journey when the craft needs to do more complicated missions. 

Thursday, December 16, 2021

The future of interstellar spacecraft.

The future of interstellar spacecraft. 




The interstellar spacecraft might not come to practice very soon. But the fact is that theoretical research. Along with careful missions is opening the road to the interstellar journey. And maybe the time of that mission will come in 200-300 years. The fact is that nobody knows when we are ready to travel to the other solar system. When we remember history many things have been "impossible".  

The Chinese knew how to make gunpowder rockets in the 200s(1). And the Russian Konstantin Tsiolkovsky(2)(1857-1935) created theoretical research with rocketry and spaceflight in the 19th century. The thing is that things like interplanetary spaceflights. And space elevators(3) are also invented by Konstantin Tsilkovsky. 




Image 2: Konstantin Tsiolkovsky (1857-1935)


That man is called "the Father of the spaceflight". Tsiolkovsky also created research and articles about "lighter than air aviation". There was a rumor that Tsiolkovsky created an idea to use the hydrogen balloon or high-flying airship to carry space rockets to the high altitude. And then launch that rocket to the orbiter or sub-orbiting trajectory. 

The hydrogen balloon can lift the rocket to an altitude of 30 kilometers. And that thing could make it possible to launch smaller rockets to the orbiter. But for some reason, that plan remained at the theoretical level. And that reason could be bureaucracy. 

The thing is that technology advances all the time. And maybe the advancing of technology is faster than we think. The thing is that the first interstellar mission might become reality sooner than we expect. The thing is that the theory is the first step for making dreams real. And modern scientists have more advanced tools and experience than Konstantin Tsiolkovsky. 

But there are many things. What that man invented and what remains at the theoretical level. One of his greatest ideas is the space elevator. That giant structure that uses the centripetal force of the Earth is ever created in practice.  



Image 3: The Daedalus and Saturn V comparison


The British Interplanetary Society. And theoretical Project Daedalus(3) and its improvements. 


There are a couple of theoretical concepts for interstellar spacecraft. All of those concepts are probes. And the carefully made steps will open the road for successful manned interstellar missions far away in the future. But the first interstellar concepts would be more primitive than some SciFi spacecraft that travels across the galaxy in a couple of weeks. 

In the 1970s the British interplanetary society created Daedalus. Theoretical spacecraft. That could travel to Barnard's star. Daedalus planned to use thermonuclear detonations for reaching that distant star. In the updated version the Daedalus uses antimatter. 

When Daedalus closes the objective of its mission. That craft will create antimatter by using an antimatter generator. The antimatter would be created by benefiting the solar wind which impacts the gold leaf. That thing turns those particles into antimatter. That thing makes it possible that Daedalus II could bring samples from the solar system where it visits. 

NASA has created an idea of "Project Longshot" (4) which is quite similar to Daedalus. As I earlier wrote the both of those theoretical crafts are unmanned. So there are no worries about the lifetime of astronauts. But of course, there is the possibility that the theoretical interstellar probe is forgotten if there is some kind of other problems on Earth.  But the time of that craft will be far away in the future. 


(1)http://en.chinaculture.org/created/2005-07/21/content_70826.htm


(2)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konstantin_Tsiolkovsky


(3)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_elevator


(4)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Daedalus


(5)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Longshot


Image 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konstantin_Tsiolkovsky


Image 2: Pinterest

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