LinkNotes: Light Propulsion -- Laser-Propelled Spaceships

2009-09-05

Light Propulsion -- Laser-Propelled Spaceships

Laser-Propelled Spaceships Could Transform Transportation

Beamed Energy Propulsion (BEP) is far more than a dream or idea: It is a powerful enabling technology that will radically transform the future of air and space transportation. It is physics, not imagination.

BEP permits us to build and fly hyper-energetic vehicles driven by remote sources of laser, microwave, and mm-wave power. Such vehicles provide unique performance that would be impossible to achieve with traditional, combustion-based engines. Vehicles driven by BEP will be "greener," safer, smaller, lighter, faster, and far more efficient than any currently existing means of flight transport.

clipped from www.livescience.com

$Artist\'s concept of a spaceship powered by laser light, or Beamed Energy Propulsion (BEP). Credit: Matt Kneght$

Artist's concept of a spaceship powered by laser light, or Beamed Energy Propulsion (BEP). Credit: Matt Kneght

clipped from science.howstuffworks.com

How Light Propulsion Will Work

Photo courtesy Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
An early model of a laser-propelled lightcraft

The basic idea behind light propulsion is the use of ground-based lasers to heat air to the point that it explodes, propelling the spacecraft forward. If it works, light propulsion will be thousands of times lighter and more efficient than chemical rocket engines, and will produce zero pollution.

Photo courtesy Rensselaer
A lightcraft in action. The bright light you see is the air combusting under the rim of the craft.

clipped from science.howstuffworks.com

As the laser pulses, it superheats the air until it combusts. Each time the air combusts, it creates a flash of light, as seen in this photo of a test flight.