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Interview with Dr. Bradley C. Edwards
Keith Curtis writes "I recently discovered that Dr. Bradley C. Edwards, noted expert on the Space Elevator pays $4 for coffee at the same Starbucks that I do. I asked him if he would meet up with me and chat and he graciously agreed. I recorded the interview for posterity. In our wide-ranging conversation we talked about NASA politics, getting energy from space, location, space tourism, software, nanotech, and several other topics."
Keith Curtis: Excuse me, aren't you Dr. Bradley C. Edwards... THE Dr. Bradley C. Edwards, noted expert on the Space Elevator?
/.!!!!
Dr. Bradley C. Edwards: Yes. Aren't you the guy that that's been stalking me for the past year? THE guy I have a restraining order against?
Keith Curtis: Guilty as charged! Now that we have introductions out of the way, can I have an interview for my blog?! I'll pay for your Venti Iced Caramel Macchiato.
Dr. Bradley C. Edwards: Alright, since you already know what I order on Wednesdays, I might as well.
Keith Curtis: AWESOME! I'm gonna be famous on
with no place to go but up!
Cake or Death? Cake Please!
Hilarious!
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
heck, I was really going to do a usefull post about nano tech and the space elevator and giant springs but I could not resist myself and decided go on the lines of FIRST P0ST!!!!!!!!!!!
-- Por mais que eu ande no vale das trevas e da morte, meu PowerMac G4 Não Travará!!!
Interview with Dr. Bradley Edwards
October 14, 2005 on 1:28 pm | In Uncategorized |
Seattle, A Hotbed For Space Elevator Development?
KC: My jaw dropped when I went to my nearest Starbucks, saw your artwork on the wall, and realized that you lived in Seattle. How long have you been here? It doesn't exactly seem to be a hotbed for space elevator work...
BE: I did my work for NIAC (NASA Institute For Advanced Concepts) here in 2000, and then moved back in June. I was working with people everywhere; most of the collaboration was virtual, and many folks I didn't meet until the end. I don't think I met Eric Westling until after we published our book (The Space Elevator: A Revolutionary Earth-to-Space Transportation System). A few people I'm currently working with I still haven't met. I don't work with people just because they're local, I have to find people I think are the best. It depends on what I'm working on. It's an effort that can be largely broken up into sections. "Here is the anchor station, go do it." Actually, it's great that I don't have to have everyone in the same room because it's just not possible.
I tried to look up your biography on the Internet, and couldn't track down some of the organizations you've worked in. Some of them are probably from the early Internet days...
We've been trying to get various projects started. A few were a few false starts, or in some cases just testing the waters. HighLift Systems was a Seattle-based company, and was one of those false starts. I closed it down. I'm not affiliated with LiftPort. I have worked with LiftPort's founder Michael Laine a bit at HighLift in Seattle before we parted ways. [Not on the best of terms; juicy but unsubstantiated gossip about LiftPort removed, Meow!! -ed]
NASA Versus Private Industry
Did you see Michael Griffin's interview in USA Today last week?
No, but I know the general gist. It's not a surprise. In my mind the Space Shuttle and Space Station are not valuable efforts. It's not what NASA should be doing. NASA is using technology from commercial enterprises, or very old technology from the 70's to try and do space exploration. If they are going to be a real premier space agency, they need to be pushing it.
They should be doing stuff which looks to us like science fiction...
It shouldn't be science fiction, but they should be pushing the boundaries and doing work that inspires. That's what Apollo was. The technology for Apollo existed before the program started; they took that knowledge and pushed it to its limits, and it literally inspired the world.
I wasn't around then, but it seems like peoplecared what NASA did back then. NASA has their Moon and Mars pictures up on their website, but I don't know if anyone cares. If you squint as you look, you'd think it was 1930.
It is history; it's old news. And since then, they've done very little.
It seems like there was a long-standing debate between rockets and the Space Shuttle. From where you sit, that's like choosing between Nicki and Paris Hilton.
Even high up in NASA management, they won't officially say it - but they have said it directly to me - that nothing substantial in space can be done with rockets. A federal program with lots of money can take some people up there, but it won't be able to commercialize space. We've been going at it for thirty-five years now, and we've put up telecommunications systems and GPS. If there's a buck to be made and a product to be built, it'll get done. With current technology, I think we've developed space commercially as far as we can. We need something dramatically different--a brand new market, a brand new technology.
Economists should get that. How did trains and highways change America?
Private enterprise is starting to get it. NASA hasn't shown much interest on the space elevator, but there are a number of private entities that have.
But we just laughed at a bunch of them: HighLift, LiftPort. Do any of them have billions of dollars?
Th
In need of reliable and affordable server monitoring?
dude, you put in your actual email address mailto:keithcu@gmail.com!! teh spambots are coming!
That is probably the most informed discussion about the current state of advanced energy/space technologies that I have ever read. Dr. Edwards seems like a very even-handed, practical, and worldly individual, with the kind of vision we need to truly make progress in coming decades.
Too bad he's is a space elevator wacko. Narf!@#!!
Space shuttle 4-eva!
Sometime ago I heard that to pull off the space elevator .. the material cost would be massive that we didnt have enough steel cable to do such a thing and only experimental substances (like spiderweb yarn) would meet the challenge of providing that much material.
Is this true? What sort of materials will the Space Elevator make use of?
How about doing a QandA with Slashdot user questions? :D
Cheers!_Vishal www.squad9.com
... of harmonics? That is, how on earth (or wherever) are they going to keep a giant 20,000-mile long (minimum) string from vibrating, tearing itself away from its moorings and giving passengers a severe case of lawnmower shakes? Awful hard to do the random weighting thing they do with high-tension power lines when you want a robot to climb it (fast). ... or terrorist attacks? Yah, I know that's passe and overrated as a topic, and that it applies to any transport medium. But it still ought to be dealt with at the design stage rather than afterwards, I think. ... or birds? Doesn't anyone care about birds? :-).
Raise your children as if you were teaching them to raise your grandchildren, because you are.
So spider-ass juice is our only hope of space travel? LOOOOOOOOOL
:D
i efeel sory for the spidders in the year 504309, they spin webs like whipped prison bitches
"noted expert on the Space Elevator pays $4 for coffee at the same Starbucks that I do"
ya know, that'd be the day when it happens.
But I'm afraid of heights, you insensitive clod!
I just don't see one, the most fundamental, question in all interview. I don't worry about climber construction or powering them (it's after all "just" engineering - even if powering means, that you'll put very very small reactor on the climber and restrict it going only from 1000 Km and higher and for 0-1000 you'll use chemical rockets) - BUT (!) AFAIK the material is problem! I've read somewhere, that the strongest nanotube ever produced is still only 50% of necessary strength - and THAT'S a LONG way to go! (you can't use just 100% necessary strength - you need more for safety - something like 130-150%!)
You must be new here, the space elevator is often discussed. Take a look at this article, for information.
The material used is carbon nanotubes, not steel.
Wikipedia is here to answer your questions.
Retarded!
Sometime ago I heard that to pull off the space elevator .. the material cost would be massive that we didnt have enough steel cable to do such a thing and only experimental substances (like spiderweb yarn) would meet the challenge of providing that much material.
Steel is extremely dense. The sheer quantity of steel needed would mean the elevator would collapse under its own weight. That is why nobody plans on using steel cables. Instead, carbon nanotubes are the way to go. Essentially, these are thin strands of carbon engineered in such a way that they are light and strong. A strand the thickness of a human hair has the strength of a steel girder, but weighs around 0.00001% as much. Nanotechnology means more than just making things small, it also means building life-size objects but engineering them at the molecular level to have special properties, such as high strength or low density.
24 beers in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence? I think not!
A strand the thickness of a human hair has the strength of a steel girder, but weighs around 0.00001% as much.
Any particular reason they don't they make buildings out of these carbon strands instead of with steel girders?
Slashdot requires you to wait longer between hitting 'reply' and submitting a comment.
Made from a Cuzco corn hybrid.
BBQ FTW.
Guess my head is the wrong place again. I just finished up some DVD authoring. I was kind of looking forward to an audio recording. Interesting interview regardless. :)
Right on. And then pay 4$(!!!) for coffee? Hello?
I never understood why man is obsessed with going to space... I bet it has nice view of our globe ;) but I understand its the most dangerous place on earth (hmm... actually off earth), right after port morsbey ;)
;)
The concept of having a big "rope" in the middle of the sea, reaching out to space, with elavator/s connected to it, exposed to attacks from Al Quaida, Bush (if Al Quaida ever uses it), The sea, the wind, commets, space debree, mir stations, dumb people pressing the wrong buttons, harrasing the elavator or crowding it (especially with the overweight problem in the world) and whatnot.. it will NEVER work (Just like trying to make medicine of germs). Mark my words
"From the moment I could talk, I was ordered to listen" - Cat Stevens
Seriously dude, it's good for the economy.
We need idiots at the top to keep us idiots down at the bottom.
cost
Any particular reason they don't they make buildings out of these carbon strands instead of with steel girders?
Unfortunately, we can't yet make strands longer than a few centimeters...
I wonder if it's just a parody...or if it's been taken seriously in Slashdot... I rarely come over here, but, AFAIK, there are very interesting discussions here, and very bright people...that's why it surprised me to see this interview treated as it it was a serious proposition (even in the responses exposing concerns)... The most basic common sense says that such 'Space Elevator' can't be a serious project, is there something I'm missing?
A strand the thickness of a human hair has the strength of a steel girder, but weighs around 0.00001% as much.
;-)
Any particular reason they don't they make buildings out of these carbon strands instead of with steel girders?
The little piglet that tried found that the unusually low weight made his house much too easy to blow over by the big bad wolf.
SCO employee? Check out the bounty
Because they are just now building the first plant to manufacture carbon nanotubes in Milville, New Jersey, you dolt.
I read this website and I realise that beyond the limited realm of computers the folk who hang out here are, with a few exceptions, generally as ignorant as the average man in the street. The idea that someone with a computer and access to the internet would not understand that carbon nanotubes are cutting edge technology and not something available off the shelf at your local Ace Hardware is mind boggling. This cuts to the very heart of the question of worldview. I have to wonder what the worldview is of someone who doesn't understand where his civilization stands technologically--what is possible and what is not yet possible.
"Is this Winkhorst a nova criminal?" "No just a technical sergeant wanted for interrogation."
How can coffee cost $4? Sorry, i'm from Europe, so i really don't understand.
Who is John Galt?
That's it - that's just great. You smacked the beehive with a stick... and there's nothing worse that a bee that drinks Bawls.
Cake or Death? Cake Please!
Flamebate!
I'd like to point out that current CNT preps yield very polydisperse samples both in terms of diameter and length. And also that getting tubes longer than 1-2 microns is difficult. Using them for a space elevator may happen one day, but we're nowhere close. Also- currently we're not engineering things at a molecular level. or rather we are, but not on a molecule by molecule basis that some people tend to assume we're working with. For instance, we coat with a single monolayer of molecules, but over a larger area. Nanotech has a long way to go before it turns into the future we see in The Diamond Age (Neil Stephenson)
He can't be all that smart if he pays $4 for a cup of coffee...
Hilarious!
So, your point is?... Do we need to put very strict controls *everywhere*? Or do you think weapons in space would be significantly more dangerous than weapons anywhere else? Why would space be a more attractive place to put vast amounts of weapons than, let's say, Nebraska, or in submarines under the sea, or in whatever other places there are vast amounts of weapons today?
Aside from the obvious problems with the fact that steel is a lot easier to produce and less expensive than carbon nanotubes right now, that "strength" he's talking about is tensile strength, not compressive or shear strength. (Ref.: here.) Just because something has a large amount of tensile strength doesn't mean you'd want to build a building out of it.
In fact I'm fairly certain that there are types of plastic (nylon maybe) which when woven together have more tensile strength per unit mass and volume than a comparable amount of steel, and I'm looking out my window right now and don't see any plastic-framed skyscraper buildings.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
...it's doable as long as the US government doesn't get involved.
Also- currently we're not engineering things at a molecular level. or rather we are, but not on a molecule by molecule basis that some people tend to assume we're working with.
This is what I meant. Rather than engineering steel by "measure this much iron, this much carbon, etc and smelt it all in a big pot," nanotech is about taking elements and getting them to do what we want on a smaller scale -- rather than melting stuff in a pot, use various techniques to get molecules to align certain ways, create crystals or buckeyballs or whatever the latest thing is. Like you mentioned, coating with a layer of molecules -- obviously we aren't placing them one at a time, but stacking the deck as far as what molecules used and exploiting their properties so they only layer one or two deep. That may not be nanotech, but it is a similar idea.
24 beers in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence? I think not!
Congrats on finding and interviewing the only science PhD in the country who doesn't think Bush is a fucking idiot.
Now before I get modded down, I be to remind whoever might read this that what I am saying is FACT. - bogaboga
As innumerable slashdotters have said before, when Bradley Edwards can build a bridge as long as this one out of nanotubes of the requisite tensile strength, then I'll take the space elevator seriously. Until then, it's science fiction and NASA's quite correct to plan its Moon-Mars program out of technology that actually exists.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
Well, I think nanotech can be used to describe any engineering process which has some controllable dimension less than 100 nm. The idea that my initial response was trying to convey was that we can do things on the nanoscale, but we still use billions upon billions of molecules to do it. No one has figured out a way to get around the "sticky fingers" problem to control single moleculesv(for more info, do a goodle serach to read Smalley and Drexlers debate on molecular assemblers), and personally I dont think they will in my lifetime. And putting monolayers on a surface is largely wet chemistry from many years ago; it's just recently that we have the tools to "read" our results with enough precision to distinguish molecular precision.
While we're at it, back in Forbidden Planet (1956), didn't they already talk about civilisations wiped out by "the monster from the id"? Also 50 years ahead of their time, truly +5 Foresightful, was that id as in RF-ID, by any chance?
Faith in the patent system on this planet should quickly fade in anyone staring in disbelief at the word "GRANTED" rubberstamped across a document with lines like:
Spelling obviously isn't the only problem in this thing:Beam me out of this esp@cenet, Scotty!Lots of folks have gone off about using nanotubes and such to replace the fiber in "fiberglass" and all tests of bulk material properties (so far) that I'm aware of have shown essentially no net gain. So far, it seems, you can't make the nanotubes and such long enough to effectively be gripped by the binding component to do any good whatsoever. Or cross link the molecules well enough to do away with the need for the binder's strength. Else we'd already have things like fighter planes and cars made of them. So far, no good. This is not to say it won't happen. And yes, steel is neat stuff, but way out of it's league on this job.
1) What does he know that he can tell usabout electrical potential differences along the cable, both crossing Earth's magnetic field lines and between upper atmosphere and ground? I think yet another short tether test is anticipated soon by satellite, I recall the first one failed. I know quite a few methods are used to trigger lightning now, from rocket-carried wires to lasers ionizing a column of air.
2) Where can we invest?
3) Wouldn't a branching structure like a suspension bridge -- several orbital counterweights somewhat separated, crosslinked, and several sea level contact points -- be safer than a single cable, spread out to protect against the random meteor or space debris impact, lightning strike, aircraft strike, or structural flaw?
4) When I lived in Seattle in the early '70s, before Starbucks, there were good coffee houses all over the place. Does anyone besides Starbucks sell coffee in his neighborhood now?
4$, and I probably won't even be able to call that "coffe"; warm, black water may be more appropriate. Crazy stuff... Bye!
SeqBox
I read this website and I realise that beyond the limited realm of computers the folk who hang out here are, with a few exceptions, generally as ignorant as the average man in the street.
I have two responses. The first is to deny: the average man on the street does not even know what a space elevator is, or whether NASA has sent rovers to multiple planets or just one. You responded to a single misinformed (low-rated) post and ignored the others that were better informed.
I have to wonder what the worldview is of someone who doesn't understand where his civilization stands technologically--what is possible and what is not yet possible.
The second is to agree: nobody knows on any given day precisely what is technologically possible and what is not. I didn't know that a carbon nanotube factory is being built. You probably have gaps in your knowledge, whether they relate to the current state of biology, astrophysics, art or international law. If you think that a person should be too embarassed about their gaps in knowledge to ask a question then you have a very harsh "worldview" -- to use your pet term.
The idea that someone with a computer and access to the internet would not understand that carbon nanotubes are cutting edge technology and not something available off the shelf at your local Ace Hardware is mind boggling.
I happen to read a lot of science media so I know that carbon nanotubes are in the future. 95% of people in the world have other interests and I personally have no problem with that. I would much rather that they pay attention to politics or world affairs rather than the question of whether a particular technology is available THIS YEAR, or NEXT YEAR or FIVE YEARS FROM NOW. It's very short-sighted to think that those kinds of timelines are important in the big picture. If we were talking about the millions of people around the world who think that Iraq or Israel blew up the WTC then I'd share your concern. But we're talking about the current state of manufcuture of a currently obscure material. Millions of people have an inquisitive and informed "worldview" without knowing anything about carbon nanotubes.
To conclude, I would rather be an ignorant science-o-phobe than a pompous, elitist dickhead.
Sadly not. It began on a mailing list but I just checked and the list archive is private. Maybe one day I'll get whatever permissions are necessary and put together a web page. I first found a reference to the patent in the BBC science message boards where James Avey is one of the regular errm... eccentrics and my connection to the UKPO was with regard to a completely unrelated subject, but when I saw the Avey patent I couldn't resist bringing it up. Most of the fun was in the gradual extraction of the 'terribly disappointing' information that the patent had been whittled down to nothing more than a claim to a shiny aluminium sphere during its examination. Despite our differences I've found the UKPO man concerned and his colleagues deserve respect for their competence and rigour and I knew all along there was very little chance they'd granted the patent as it appears in the EPO database. My dreams of interstellar exploration were indeed finally shattered:
> The claims were amended substantially. I don't have it in front of me now,
> but if my memory is correct, the claims as granted only relate to a novel
> shape and construction of craft - ie. with no suggestion of bending gravity,
> or warp technology etc..
Damn. I had hoped to be flying my own ship "round the moons of Nibia and round
the Antares maelstrom" before too long. Now we're back to square one and I
probably won't even get to watch the manned Mars landings on the telly before
I die
Have a good weekend.
So it turned out that James Avey wasn't the real Zephron Cochran after all
I want to be the one to build the first strawman out of carbon nanotubes.
Tubeman? Nanostraw... guy...??? I'm open to suggestions for the name.
Now before I get modded down, I be to remind whoever might read this that what I am saying is FACT. - bogaboga
Buckyman! Maybe technically incorrect, but a lot more fun than your ideas to say.
With a space elevator, is it possible the carbon cables could cause a short between the ground and ionisphere? How would this effect weather? Could this problem be turned around and used as a meathod of powering the elevator and then some?
Life is not for the lazy.
>>So are you resigned to the fact that Michael Griffin's successor
>> is going to do another mea-culpa in 20 years? The space
>>elevator will be flying on by, and NASA will be stuck with their
>> tiny little rockets and lunar landers.
>Well, NASA will continue to do what they've always done,
>which is to provide employment.
According to the Associated Press as reported by the Washington Post, at least 300 jobs will be lost at NASA's Jet Propulsion Labratory. So apparently they haven't always done that. But hey, positive spin eh?
"Love is like pi - natural, irrational, and very important." (Lisa Hoffman)
Also be sure to propose including this with the next SETI transmission - and before we know it, aliens from all across the galaxy should come rushing to earth for a laugh.
However, tell that to the SMEs who (according to the EPO, EU Council & Commission (cf. Latest News section) ought to spend much time and money on the "easy job" of checking all of their work against patent databases with entries like this...Space elevator topics always generate a lot of posts about super-materials. But ultra strong cables are only needed if the elevator is static -- that is, it hangs its own weight from orbit.
Dynamically supported structures are also possible, and could be built with current technology and materials. Proposed designs exist for structures that internally carry circulating metal plates that provide upward force on the enclosing structure. There's also a design with a moving conductive loop that will lift itself when current is applied.
The usual concern about dynamic structures is safety issues and reliability of the dynamic components. An actual engineered example would have to include mulitple redundant support systems and plan for maintenance downtime.
Hybrid designs are of course possible, with some of the weight of the structure supported statically and some dynamically.
That's about 3 euros isn't it? How can you pay that much for a cup of coffee?
Elevators in buildings were at first considered unsafe in the 1800's and were initially only used for cargo. Assuming we can develop the technology to build the thing, it probably only should be used for cargo. My personal guess is that we'll have to work out the human and sociological issues before we humans can generate the resources and materials to build the thing in the first place. One country won't be able to do it, unless political boundaries shift dramatically.
"There is no more new frontier, we have got to make it here."
We are the 198 proof..
To paraphrase Richard Nixon, I am not a Dickhead! though I have read most of his novels.
But the "discussion" is about space elevators/sky hooks. And the one remaining technological hurdle is coming up with a material that will support the elevator and will not snap, and the only thing available, as far as I can tell, is carbon-nanotube-based fiber. That is why LiftPort (http://www.liftport.com/) is building their plant at Millville for the specific purpose of providing the technical and financial support for a space elevator they plan to build by 2018. As for the tenor of my post, it was in response to a single instance of a multitude of responses whose basis in fact is what the posters perceive to be true and not what is readily accessible on the web. And my complaint is that there has been a flurry of such offtopic threads of late that focus on some tiny little bit of a factoid that has nothing to do with the actual story, the main reason for which seems to have something to do with the attitude that the posters are smarter than the expert because they know more about xyz than he does. I would, actually, rather read a discussion of the details of the story, if that isn't asking too much.
"Is this Winkhorst a nova criminal?" "No just a technical sergeant wanted for interrogation."