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Hyperdrive Propulsion Could Be Tested At the LHC
KentuckyFC writes "In 1924, the influential German mathematician David Hilbert calculated that a stationary mass should repel a particle moving towards or away from it at more than half the speed of light (as seen by a distant inertial observer). Now an American physicist has pointed out that the equal and opposite effect should also hold true: that a relativistic particle should repel a stationary mass. This, he says, could form the basis of a 'hypervelocity propulsion drive' for accelerating spacecraft to a good fraction of the speed of light. The idea is that the repulsion allows the relativistic particle to deliver a specific impulse that is greater than its specific momentum, an effect that is analogous to the elastic collision of a heavy mass with a much lighter, stationary mass, from which the lighter mass rebounds with about twice the speed of the heavy mass. Unlike other exotic hyperdrive proposals, this one can be tested using the world's largest particle accelerator, the LHC, which will generate beams of particles with the required energy (abstract). Placing a test mass next to the beam line and measuring the forces on it as the particles pass by should confirm the theory — or scupper it entirely."
With something so simple as to elastic collision, who would have thunk it?
Theoretically it makes sense, and what's cool about it is that it can be done with today's technology.
Pretty cool.
Next thing you know we'll have Romulans visiting. I'm liking all of this already..
Previewing comments are for sissies!
There's a hyperdriven black hole careering all around Northern Europe? That's a hot mess waiting to happen.
I agree, it should be downgraded to the less impressive and more hierarchically correct megadrive or perhaps superdrive.
Can they still go plaid at those speeds?
"Our goal each year should be to increase the number of goals we set for ourselves!"
Agreed. The only 'hyper' in this story is hyperbole.
I can see the fnords!
Has that thing got a Hemi in it?
I'm sure someone posting Anonymously on /. has the courage to stand up to thugs.
Not a typewriter
AwesomeDrive64.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
If you name it Hyperdrive now, what will you name a FTL drive? Full-speed Hyperdrive? Hi-Speed?
Hi-Definition Hyperdrive -- or HDHD.
No, hyperdrive isn't sufficient to go to plaid. For that you need a system capable of ludicrous speed. </pendantic>
I am officially gone from
OK. Me first. Got dibs on Andromeda. Poor chaps what will they do when they discover that we had filed the plans to build a highway through them and taped it to the underside of a sink in an unused bath room in a dark basement guarded by leopards?
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Zephram Cochrane?
Holy fetch, sublught? I give up, need sleep.
Or just some guy who doesn't talk and carries a crowbar.
Hyperdrive with SpeedBoost(tm) technology.
Naw, the MegaDrive was a dog; even when they called it the "Genesis". I'd rather have an SNES.
The SuperDrive is pretty cool, though. Makes a nice add-on to your Mac.
"Helm, full impulse." Ah, Impulse engines..
Not to mention that Hilbert was already preoccupied with the sphere packing problem, so at that time he had no spare balls which he could have employed in solving other problems.
Ezekiel 23:20
You have stopped swinging from a chain?
I feel fantastic, and I'm still alive.
Chuck Norris doesn't do push-ups... He pushes the world down.
-- "Oh. This guy again."
But I'm already going that fast.
I posted this message 61,282 years ago.
All that advance warning and you still can't get the first post.
Whenever my brother wants to go really fast, he calls it "I'lldrive"
Atheism is a non-prophet organisation