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by Retric
5243 days ago
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Sending people to the moon was an incredibly expensive process that gained us nothing. If we are going to spend significant resources on colonizing space it must either be economically viable or at worst a small net cost that can be reasonably subsidized for the long term. So while we are not there yet, there has been fundamental progress on 5 significant technology's for actually developing space since 1972. Step 1: LEO
Scram Jet's which can dramatically increase payload to orbit. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scramjet Carbon Nano-tubes, which is the first material that could enable a realistic space tether. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_nanotube http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tether_propulsion Step 2: After LEO
Ion Thrusters http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ion_thruster which when coupled with high efficiency solar panels enables better delta V than chemical rockets. And makes mining the asteroid belt a reasonable possibility. Solar Sail's which could enable realistic travel to nearby stars by probes or robots to build infrastructure. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_sail The delta V on slowing down is a major issue if you want to do more than a simple fly by which makes Solar Sail's the best non nuclear option for colonization. Step 3: Power
Fission makes living in space between stars viable. The power requirements for a colonizing the ort cloud and then moving further to the next star(s) only work when you can acquire ridiculous amounts of power, store it for long periods of time, and then tap it on demand. Of the 5 fusion is both the most important and the furthest from fruition but it's still on the path to viability in the next 100 years. |
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PS: Voyager 1 was also launched in 1977 which is the first Interstellar craft ever built. Not that it pushes back the end of the 'golden' time period of space travel that far, but it's still outside of the window your thinking about.