RESEARCHERS from McGill University have proposed using a giant laser to power mankind’s future missions to Mars.
Colonizing Mars has long been on the agenda of major aeronautical agencies like Nasa and SpaceX.
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For a while, though, the idea seemed more science fiction than reality — that is, until now.
With Nasa finally recruiting crew members for a year-long Mars simulation mission, and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk vowing to colonize the Red Planet by 2050, it seems Mars might be man’s next stop in space.
Still, many important challenges need to be tackled before the dream of colonizing Mars can come to fruition.
One of the biggest concerns for scientists is figuring out how to provide astronauts on Mars with supplies both quickly and frequently.
As a possible resolution to this concern, a team of researchers from McGill University has proposed using a 10-meter wide laser to send a spacecraft to Mars.
The Earth-based laser would heat hydrogen plasma in a chamber behind the spacecraft, propelling it to the Red Planet in just 45 days — significantly lower than the normal one-way travel time of about nine months.
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“Laser-thermal propulsion enables rapid transport missions of one ton with laser arrays the size of a volleyball court,” said Emmanuel Duplay, lead author of the study and former McGill University engineering student, per Phys.org.
The team added that once the spacecraft got to Mars, it would utilize its atmosphere to “aerobrake,” or in other words, decelerate rapidly.
The team outlined their methodology further in a paper published in the journal Acta Astronautica’s March 2022 edition.
While the proposed plan has promise, there are still major kinks that would need to be worked out before it could move past the conceptual phase.
Such concerns include the amount of fuel required by the spacecraft, which would reduce the overload payload mass, as well as thrusting the spacecraft back to Earth once it has completed its mission on Mars.
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This post first appeared on Thesun.co.uk
