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d3mm
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NASA's current report on their EAGLEWORKS lab for spacecraft propulsion
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=2...matchallpartial%20&Ntk=All&N=0&Ntt=eagleworks
The actual PDF is here: http://hdl.handle.net/2060/20110023492
EDIT: A mod might want to consider moving this to the BtSM section. It's discussing both Alcubierre's warp drive paper, and a plasma engine using the vacuum energy as both power source and reaction mass.
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=2...matchallpartial%20&Ntk=All&N=0&Ntt=eagleworks
NASA/JSC is implementing an advanced propulsion physics laboratory, informally known as Eagleworks", to pursue propulsion technologies necessary to enable human exploration of the solar system over the next 50 years, and enabling interstellar spaceflight by the end of the century... The lab will first implement a low-thrust torsion pendulum (<1 uN), and commission the facility with an existing Quantum Vacuum Plasma Thruster. The lab will eventually incorporate an interferometer to be used to measure York Time effects of test devices (expansion/contraction of space) [test Alcubierre's warp drive effect] ... . If the physics and engineering models can be explored and understood in the lab to allow scaling to power levels pertinent for human spaceflight, 400kW SEP human missions to Mars may become a possibility, and at power levels of 2MW, 1-year transit to Neptune may also be possible
The actual PDF is here: http://hdl.handle.net/2060/20110023492
EDIT: A mod might want to consider moving this to the BtSM section. It's discussing both Alcubierre's warp drive paper, and a plasma engine using the vacuum energy as both power source and reaction mass.
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