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[marked-for-expiry]
This isn't an invention, but I wanted to canvass opinion of my
fellow HalfBakers.
I've been invited to take part in a workshop in Brussels, in
which the EC is trying to identify possible space-related
topics for future incentive prizes (analogous to the X-Prizes
etc).
I got roped into this because of the N-Prize, which is
apparently Europe's only current space-based incentive prize.
There's an online survey (see link below), and the organizers
said we should feel free to distribute it to any interested
parties. So, please feel free to express your opinions by
responding to the survey.
More generally, if anyone has any suggestions for cool space-
based competitions, with prizes up to a few million euros and
timescales up to about 3 years, let me know either by
annotating here or by emailing me (address is on my profile
page).
The workshop is quite soon (23rd of Feb), and if anything
interesting comes of it I'll let y'all know.
Survey
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/Y5LT3C6
[MaxwellBuchanan, Feb 11 2015]
I'd still like this to exist
Webcam_20on_20the_20Moon
[hippo, Feb 12 2015]
Planet_20You
i'm taking this opportunity to promote my idea of 2007 which was (inter alia) my attempt at democratising space ownership [xenzag, Feb 12 2015]
LauncherOne
http://www.virginga...m/satellite-launch/
For [TIB]. [neutrinos_shadow, Feb 12 2015]
http://www.inbloon.com/
[hippo, Feb 13 2015]
Gilligan_27s_20Orbital_20Island
[FlyingToaster, Feb 13 2015]
Pendulum test contest
http://www.nemitz.net/vernon/Pendulum.gif
A device that can pass that test would be worthy of significant investigation. [Vernon, Feb 24 2015]
Why lunar colonization is essential to society.
http://what-if.xkcd.com/124/
[scad mientist, Feb 24 2015]
http://forum.kerbal...ound-Mun-and-Kerbin
[hippo, Feb 25 2015]
SatNOGS - Global Network of Ground Stations
https://hackaday.io/project/1340
Winner of The Hackaday Prize 2014 [notexactly, Mar 02 2015]
[link]
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I'd like to see the following list of dumb ideas off the top of
my head end up back on top of my head, but at a greater
altitude: |
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- A single stage to orbit craft launched from a high altitude
aircraft. Nothing big... Maybe a payload of <5kg. Perhaps a
modified rocket designed to fit the White Knight and launch
from 70-80,000 ft. |
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- An engine that can use orbital debris as fuel. Metals,
plastics and ceramics must be ionized and exhausted, or
exhausted by some other means. |
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- A space-mop: A satellite that uses photon pressure, either
from a laser or concentrated sunlight, to track and push
small debris into the atmosphere for disposal (larger debris
is eaten by the orbital engine above). |
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- Orbital MeshNet: A series of tiny satellites that operate as
a mesh network with up/downlink to Earth, for use by the
public. |
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- Upper atmosphere ionizing laser (shooting down from
above): Creates radio reflectors allowing radio signals on
Earth to bounce over the horizon (like meteor trails
currently do). |
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- Piggyback telescopes: designed to be attached to, but not
interfere with, compatible satellites. Small - max of 1m
when deployed.
Possibly used for a dwarf star survey, or asteroid hunting. |
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- Earthrise camera: one purpose -- stream a nice view from
the Moon of the Earth. |
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- Low moon orbiter: Get as low as possible, as in skimming
the mountains, and stream the view. |
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- Pi in the sky: Raspberry Pi contest. Use an Raspi2 to do
something, anything productive. Aim contest at high school
kids. edit: some ideas for this category: (1) The Very Tiny
Telescope Array (dwarf stars and/or asteroids) (2) Live Pi: a
LEO version of Earthrise (for all the reasons [hippo]
mentioned) (3) Mag Pi: Test of using Earth's magnetic field
to change orbital velocity; useful data for space-mop
project. |
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I'd like us to do a 'Grand Tour' again, like the Pioneer probes. That was a proper, inspirational space project. |
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I really do think streaming video of the Earth seen from space is a worthwhile idea, as [TIB] suggests, and as I said in (see link). It would have no scientific or practical value at all, but serve an emotional, environmental and philosophical function as a constant reminder that we are all
fellow-travellers on this small planet in the incomprehensible vastness of space and that if we don't take care of our "pale blue dot", no one else will. |
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//that's how people find god// - not necessarily. There seem to be a disturbing number of christians, particularly in the US, who take the view that they shouldn't worry about global warming, etc., because God will surely sort it out. This feels like it's based on the clearly flawed idea that humans are special and the main reason the universe was 'created' and so God won't allow something to happen which wipes out humankind. |
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Why? This supposes that (a) god exists, and (b) he/she cares about us. (Or have I missed a massive bit of sarcasm in your post?) |
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what TIB said. Garbage-clearer could be bipartite: a fixed-orbit satellite, and a roamer that collects old wrenches and gloves, docking with its base-station to offload trash and onload fuel for its thrusters, for the next go'round. |
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That the space-capable governments of the Earth got together and decided that they wouldn't be responsible for cleaning up their messes says loads about the governments we have. |
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Establish presence at Earth/Sol L4 & L5.
"" "" on Phobos. |
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// first buttered lobster in space project// |
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I think the EU wants to come up with projects that
differentiate it from NASA. |
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We seriously need orbital-debris removal. Debris is currently a
danger, and can cascade to where spaceflight is impossible. (I
happen to have two removal ideas, so top priority and lots of money,
please.) |
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I would like to see semi-autonomous rovers on the moon, partly just
for remote-control entertainment, and partly for science and
preparation for future use. (I would *pay* to run a mining robot on the
moon, and it could stockpile the results for someday.) |
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I am very much against space elevators. Building one would take
more launches than it could ever save, and having one up would
require the removal of all satellites (and space debris). |
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Good luck. I know that you are an excellent person for the job. |
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//I think the EU wants to come up with projects that
differentiate it from NASA// |
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Hopefully, the mechanism of differentiation wont involve
surveys with a eye-wateringly high buzzword density. |
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I agree a web-streaming HD Earthcast would be
wonderful. Even better if a network of satalites could
provide L-R separation for some sort of 3D at various
points (3 spaced out cameras would give 3 regular views,
and two separate 3D view, for example). |
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Trash collection should be a priority too. Begin by
building in a guaranteed de-orbit system, even better
provide a tax-incentive system. If your junk stays up
there after your mission: tax, you can't launch without
paying it. If your launch system/mission collects and
brings down another old satellite or other junk,
incentive. |
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Start the trash collection in the Pacific Ocean please, and get the priorities right. |
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//Good luck. I know that you are an excellent person
for the job// Aww, shucks, [bacon]. I'll do my best -
I'll probably be the only one there who doesn't have
to take it too seriously. |
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Pi in the sky sounds like an interesting one.
Piggy-backing telescopes wouldn't be feasible because of the added mass messing with things. |
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Howabout this: send aloft the smallest feasible biosphere with a lifespan that is moderately self-sustaining, which could be monitored remotely with soil / air / water / temp sampling. I'm thinking something the size of a clear bowling ball filled with odd plants, fungus, a worm or three, and associated microbial life forms? |
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// the smallest feasible biosphere// |
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Ooh, now that one I like. You can get little sealed
aquaria with a shrimp and a piece of pondweed in
them, which both survive for a considerable time.
The equivalent in space would be interesting. Main
problem would be thermoregulation, so you'd
probably want things that can be frozen and boiled
alternately - either bacteria or tardigrades... |
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Let it loose for a few years, then pick it up and see
how things have gone... |
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At a recent lab-meeting I had to give a journal-club talk. I had the pleasure of stating that I'd chosen a new paper about DNA retention on surfaces and the effect of extreme conditions, cover the detail of how it was applied to the substrate and so on. Then go on to say "Then they fired the sounding rocket into space."...
I did pull it off; it completely blindsided them. |
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I know that's not really relevant.
But sounding rockets are used pretty routinely and are presumably relatively cheap. I think experiments with those are realistic and achievable. The paper mentioned above was apparently a speculative second experiment. There could be a competition for the most innovative uses of such relatively low-end hardware. |
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Low-end is always good. We need to hack space. |
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[TIB], Virgin Galactic are doing the "SSTO" from a high-altitude aircraft (WhiteKnight2). See (linky). |
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My idea (which I wrote on the survey when asked for an idea) is :
NEO-Tagging
Send a large fleet of small satellites into space, tasked with finding NEOs. When one is found, the sat (after checking that the NEO isn't already "Tagged") lands, attaches (ground screws, claws, whatever) and starts transmitting a coded signal, basically saying "Here is a NEO". So we can find and track them more easily from Earth. |
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[neutrinos_shadow]: Very cool. Was hoping that would
happen one day. It's the logical next step, and I'm so glad
they're doing it! |
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Based on their 2-stage system, perhaps a single stage would
work with a much lower payload, maybe using a beefed up
rocket that could land itself like the SpaceX version, but
with a chute and airbags to keep it cheap. I think that
would still be a worthy goal to shoot for. |
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With modern electronics, the sats can be tiny (if needed,
swarms of tiny sats), and a reusable single stage rocket
would bring costs far under the $10M they suggest. |
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//the sats can be tiny// GoPros lanched by railgun from orbit. |
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How about a competition for development of
near-space balloon travel as a low-carbon
mass-transportation solution? I'm not sure if the link (see 'inbloon' link) is this but, in principle, if you get a balloon with a pod below it up into the jetstream, it'll travel pretty fast. |
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How about a prize for the demonstration of a workable Mechanical Counter-Pressure suit? Say, set a list of tasks, which must be performed by someone wearing it in a vacuum chamber, in order to win the prize. I think that would be very useful. |
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As for sourcing prize money, I've been thinking about crowdfunding. It's gone into those sorts of figures before. If the prize isn't won by the deadline, the people get their money back with whatever interest has accumulated (it will, of course, be invested for the duration of the contest). |
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Another prize I'd like to see is a demonstration of a near-space habitat. A crew of 5, remaining on station for a week. Bonus prize if they go on for two with a crew change in the middle. |
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//crowdfunding// good idea in general, but for
these prizes the EU will be putting up the money. |
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"Effect of vacuum and hard radiation on bamboo structural components"
(reference to one of my posts, where lightweight building materials are grown in space <link>) |
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Social engineering to point modern society to the (seemingly) disparate goals of planet preservation/replenishment and space travel. |
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ooooh! I know, that wonderful water sphere space habitat
idea from a while back! Do a feasibility study on that: small
orbiter with radiation sensitive life in, surrounded by a
sphere of liquid water with an ice surface (mineral oil
coating to lessen sublimation) possibly some cyanobacteria
in the water and some CO2 creating stuff in the middle.
Lovely. Do that. I'll donate $20. And some zebra fish
expressing a ROS sensor. I demand 1st author on the
subsequent paper. |
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//I got roped into this because of the N-Prize, which is apparently Europe's only current space-based incentive prize.//
It's not the nobel prize, admittedly, but I think that that's something to be proud of, Max.
And congratulations on the invitation; it sounds like it could (possibly) be a tremendous opportunity, in all sorts of ways.
Personally, I would second the calls for some sort of space junk clearance program. It would be a pity if, one day, we received a visit from aliens not because they had tracked our radio or TV signals, or planetary heat signature but because they had followed our trail of litter. |
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For clearing the space-junk, we could just send up Wall-E with a couple of fire hydrants for propulsion... |
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So here you go: you award points for the hardiest, smallest, biosphere feasible with the longest survival in space. Include an arduino / raspberry pi board to handle monitoring the sensors, dialing in the environmental controls, and feeding some input / output back to earth. Let the high-school kids go nuts with the biology aspects, computer science, and orbital mechanics, and Bob is your step-cousin's half-sister. |
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bung a whole mix of DNA behind a whole load of different
types of shielding, launch, wait, retrieve do all that SMG
sequencing malarkey, paper #1 on the effectiveness of
various shielding on DNA mutation, #2 on particular
sequences/packaging arrangements that are
resistant/vulnerable. If you launch part of your experiment
into orbit, it's an instant journal upgrade... this space
science is easy. Then I will provide my grandmother with an
egg-sucking protocol. |
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//Maybe we’re actually supposed to be putting
rubbish into space.// Shirley, by definition, if we put
stuff there then it's not space any more? |
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//DNA ... SMG sequencing ...space... instant journal
upgrade..// I'm liking that. |
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Also - how about a space hoover. I mean something
that'll orbit for a year, and just collect whatever dust
it encounters. Then sequence the stuff. I'll
guarantee you'll pick up human DNA (if only in freeze-
dried microdroplets of urine). And who knows...? |
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Yes, but if we created synthetic space, where would
we put it? |
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I would like to see a competition for the cheapest, lightest, most resilient, all-terrain exo-bots.
Space-bot Wars... I'd watch it. |
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Billions of years ago, and rather a few light years away: |
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"Space President Zark, the life in B-Prize biosphere has
evolved and told us 'Thanks for the Solar-dish'. It has left
orbit and is heading for a dismal star in the outer arm of a
non-interesting spiral galaxy. Surely this will degenerate
the conditions of any planet that they happen to infest.
What shall we do?" |
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Send a device to the moon, pick up available materials, use
available energy, and make something. Anything. |
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That's a good thought, lurch, although I think I would settle, at this stage, for just retrieving some useable materials. Is it time for a serious go at some small-scale asteroid mining perhaps?
An initial program of exploratory probes to identify likely candidate sites would be good. If you find anything good you could even, perhaps, auction off some of the mining rights in order to generate more cash for the ESA (European Space Agency). If you can hold out the possibility (however remote) of a new income stream then the program is more likely to get the green light, I would suggest. |
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//ambitious missions such as carving Mars into the
shape of a chicken// How do you know it didn't start
out chicken-shaped, before someone got to it? |
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I like the art angle. Robot manipulators on the moon could make an
image just using rocks. |
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My art/science project is to set up some reflectors in increasing
distances, get them nearly lined up, and fire a bloody big laser, just to
watch the speed of light. |
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I'd like to see some projects using the very spaciousness of space.
Stereo observatories are what I am thinking of, but there are probably
others that regard space as something more than just the distance to
the good stuff. |
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Another halfbaked idea of mine that might win the right cash prize
involves getting a radio antenna up over the North Pole. The
Russians use some odd-orbit Molniya satellites, as they are too far
north to get geostationary reception. |
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But all these prizes assume the inventors have the cash to build on
spec. I'd like to see some cash grants to worthy ideas. Even if they
fail, the money will be boosting the local economy, or maybe just the
local. |
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I'd like to see a good old fashioned race: so many kilos of payload to Mars or Moon in so many days. Chang-Diaz had a great idea with VASIMR but nobody has built a spaceworthy 'working model' yet. This needs to happen and they need to be common enough to encourage hacking and improvement. |
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Well, I am back from the meeting to discuss EU space
prizes (or, more likely, the first of a long series of
meetings). |
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Anyone here who completed the (somewhat tedious)
survey in the link from the EU - your responses were
taken into account. There were not many people
who completed the full survey, so those that did had
a large impact. |
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Outcome so far: it looks like the EU will fund a prize
to develop low-cost launchers. Other areas for
possible further prizes include image analysis and
processing (of satellite data); radiation protection
(for astronauts and equipment); swarm-like rovers for
planetary exploration; and modified organisms for
growth in spacecraft (as providers of food and other
things). |
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No news on the Martian Chicken project. |
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Nice work, [MaxwellBuchanan]!
Keep us posted on further meetings and developments. Suggested payload for experimental low-cost launcher: half a croissant. |
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Will do. To be honest, I am still somewhat stunned
that what started as an eighth-baked idea here has
ended up with supposedly sensible people taking me
seriously. |
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Actually maybe they just pretended to take me
seriously to shut me up. |
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If we are dreaming, I would like, a X prize for a high altitude ship. This vehicle that can ship 6 people to and from the peak of Everest in anything below 25Knots, total white out. Something Gerry Anderson would be proud of. |
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//Actually maybe they just pretended to take me seriously
to shut me up.// |
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Hmmm, high cost, high reward. |
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Seriously - well done and keep us posted. |
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//To make anything worthy of being launched into
space in a serious context, you get into serious
money// |
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Well, yes and no. Space hardware, at the moment, is
still pretty much like computers were in the 1950s.
To say that there'll never be the equivalent of a home
computer is probably tempting fate. |
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However, I should mention that the EU prize will
probably (and I can only say probably, so far) be for
launching something between 50kg and 200kg total
payload into LEO (probably 500km), for sub-€1M.
People from Ariane and other organizations were
there, and they didn't fall about laughing. |
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The prize for the launchers will probably be the
larger part of the €10M that's theoretically available.
However, I should stress that this was just an initial
meeting, and things could easily change. |
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At one point, someone put up a graph showing the
last and predicted numbers of sub-50kg payloads
from 19-something to 2020, and the graph went up
exponentially, reaching about 2000/year by 2020. I
think this is a bit like the predictions made in the
1950s that "one year, every major city will have a
computer". |
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It's envisaged that many of the entrants will be SMEs -
this is all a couple of orders of magnitude larger than
the N-Prize. |
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As for mil-spec hardware - a lot of non-critical
hardware at the moment (especially electronics) is
not mil-spec and, in some cases, is consumer stuff.
The mil spec for critical components is needed to
keep failure rates very low,
but it becomes a vicious circle: v. expensive
hardware means that everything has to work reliably,
which makes it more expensive... |
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Anyway, point is that Ariane and others think the
€1M, 200kg range is doable. It's not so very far
outside their normal scope. Of course, this decreases
the novelty and makes it less likely that we'll see a
true revolution in launch systems, but this is the EU
and they've got to balance optimism against
likelihood of success. With the N-Prize, I have no
responsibilities to anyone, and can ask for something
with a very high risk of failure. |
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Other point to note: there's currently a huge queue
to launch small payloads, and most of them rely on
piggybacking larger missions. However, some of the
most heavily-used launch systems for small payloads
(as piggybacks) are due to be phased out over the
next 5 years, which will create even more pressure
for low-mass launchers. |
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Only thing we should be arsed with as far as introspection is concerned is met sats producing ridiculously precise wind velocity vs gps/altitude/timedate data, for windmill construction purposes... including bird migration paths for those that want the occasional free meal or two. |
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Which is why I've yet to get all the way through that survey: after rating bellybutton-gazing as last-priority, the next few pages were all about do I want to see more precise GPS and stuff. Apart from the aforementioned, we've already enough of that crap for emergency (including things like nuke proliferation) surveillance, etc. No ? |
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//why every man and his dog want a small satellite//
For the same reason that every man and his dog want
a laptop. Satellites are cool and there are many
things you can do with them. They should not be the
sole province of governments and big industry, any
more than computers used to be. |
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As for the up-cluttering of space, the EU is likely to
recommend a ceiling of 500km for most small
satellites, giving them an orbital decay of 20 years.
Things in higher orbit will need a means to deorbit on
command. |
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//we've already enough of that crap for emergency
(including things like nuke proliferation) surveillance,
etc. No ?// Yes, possibly (well, actually no; good
imaging in near-real-time is still very very sparse).
However, there are
proposals such as continuous live whole-planet
imaging at 5m resolution; or monitoring at
wavelengths that allow you to monitor water stress
or disease progression in crops, so that you can farm
more efficiently. Or imaging bioluminescence to
track protozoan populations in the oceans. Or any of
a gazillion other things. |
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Why does everyone need a camera in their cellphone?
Aren't there enough pictures already? |
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//Why does everyone need a camera in their cellphone?
Aren't there enough pictures already?// |
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you can get totally acceptable images with a cell phone
of all sorts of things, I point mine down a microscope eye
piece to show people cell confluency, I take pictures of
gels and membranes. The automatic logging of time and
date (that isn't subject to someone setting the clock to
2004 to get around a software license) is pretty handy.
Now holiday photos, I get that, someone much more
talented is bound to have already taken a shot of the
Grand Canyon, right? I'll just photoshop me in later. |
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//continuous live whole-planet imaging at 5m resolution//
which leads inevitably to the classification of cloud cover
and precipitation as terrorist activities... |
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//For the same reason that every man and his dog want a laptop// |
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Ah. Trading cat videos and facebook memes in space. |
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//Spacebook// <standing-ovation> |
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Does it have to be flying stuff in space? Or can
one just interact with stuff already in space?
Bouncing signals off the moon is pretty cool,
doable by non-states, and has real world
applications. The challenge could be to connect
two cell phones via the moon. |
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Or Venus! Farther, less, but much more reflective
than the moon. And if that has been done I have
not read it. Challenge: bounce and detect a signal
from Venus. |
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//Does it have to be flying stuff in space?// Not
necessarily. One of the topics was for automated
analysis of images from existing satellites. |
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Thought of one more: The first extraterrestrial refueling (an
approximation of one at least). |
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First, send a dirty snowball into orbit to simulate a cometary
surface. Then send a probe after it with the goal of
processing the snowball into hydrogen and oxygen, storing,
and burning it in an engine (probably heat the snowball,
freeze the water vapour to separate it, then electrolyse and
liquify). |
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Use lessons gained to apply on missions to the asteroid belt,
and/or the Kuiper belt. |
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If we could refuel, a whole new slew of orbits may be
accessible, for example stopping at the outer planets rather
than zipping past. |
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//extraterrestrial refueling// That too was one of
the topics discussed. However, the problem is that a
demonstration within 2-4 years is probably not
possible, sadly. |
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Low cost launch for small payloads might be quite
useful as more applications of small satellites is
found, but it doesn't seem to me like it does
anything revolutionary. If eventually anyone could
afford to launch a satellite for say the cost of a
fairly nice new car, I expect there could be some
amazing new applications discovered, but then I'd
also expect a lot of people to use it for evil as
well. And we wouldn't be much closer to any long
term goals of exploring other planets or anything. |
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At some point we need to transition to figuring
out how to build things in space. Since the cost
of moving mass between the earth and orbit is so
high we need to focus on how to use material that
is already out of our gravity well. |
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That statement could change if we build a space
elevator, but I get the feeling that is a long term
dead end where we could waste a lot of
resources. |
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I suspect that long term we can get lower cost
satellites if we figure out how to manufacture
them on the moon, launch them towards earth
and use aerobraking to slow them enough for low
earth orbit. Eventually the only reason for
conventional rocket launches would be to move
people and send supplies of small rare parts that
we haven't figured out how to manufacture yet on
the moon. |
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Also see link for why we need to colonize the
moon. |
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//satellites... manufacture them on the moon// Ya wanna do the smelting on the Moon, but manufactory (or at least assembly) in Lunar orbit, so you don't have to design deep space satellites with the ability to withstand launch stresses. |
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// but manufactory (or at least assembly) in Lunar
orbit // possibly even better depending on the
cost of moving raw materials to lunar orbit. |
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Alternately using a lunar space elevator (much less
challenging than the terrestrial model) and doing
assembly at the L1 point might be good. |
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With this in mind I'd like to see a prize for a small
mineral processing system designed to be able to
operate on the moon and extract useful materials.
The prize would be designed to point towards the
future goal of a replicating rapid prototyping
system that can duplicate itself on the moon using
mainly local materials and a small supply of
lightweight parts delivered from earth. |
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// lunar space elevator (much less challenging than
the terrestrial model)// Is that true? What distance
from the moon's surface would a geostationary (?
selenostationary?) orbit be? |
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//What distance from the moon's surface would a geostationary (? selenostationary?) orbit be?//
Earth.
Although using L1 would be (approximately) stable.
Better to use an electromagnetic mass driver to launch raw or basic-processed materials into low orbit (no pesky atmosphere to slow things down) where they are "snagged" by the orbiting factory. |
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A stable lunar constant-position orbit would be at about
90,000 km; however, this would be outside of the moon's
"Hill sphere" (q.G.) with respect to the Earth (that is, it's
far
enough away that it would go over the edge of the
gravitational potential slope, becoming an Earth orbiter
rather than a Moon orbiter). A stable orbit
could be obtained at a Lagrange point, but those points
would not be truly constant-position, as they would
librate
over an arc of about 12 degrees as viewed from the
moon. |
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But, since it's on a 28-day cycle, I'd think you can still hit
it. |
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The other side of that coin is that your manufacturing
facility (manned, presumably?) is then the target for
incoming dumb chunks of mass at rifle-bullet speeds
(that's much slower than for Earth orbit, but still...) and
so having a good reliable catch facility would be of rather
major importance; this might tip the calculation back in
favor of having lunar surface manufacturing. |
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How about an orbiting laser reflector for the entertainment
of those sorts who enjoy aiming high-powered lasers at
airplanes and helicopters? If it comes straight back and nails
them in the eyes, well, these things happen. |
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Is there such a thing as a figure-8 orbit ? ie: once around the moon then once around the earth, rinse and repeat. |
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That would be cool - or even something which did circular or elliptical orbit around the earth-moon system. It should be possible to test out the feasibility of these orbits in KSP (Kerbal Space Program). In fact, it should be a requirement of the competition that competition entries are submitted as KSP simulations. |
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About space junk.... if a GPS unit was made small enough, it
might be installed into various small items that potentially
could become space junk. So space junk could locate itself
and report its position as long as the SIM card payments
were kept up to date. |
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//Is there such a thing as a figure-8 orbit ? // |
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There is, but it's not very stable. In effect, the
planet has to travel on a knife-edge - nudge it one
way, and it drops into an orbit around just one of the
massive bodies; nudge it the other way, and it drops
into a large ellipsoid orbit around their combined
centre of mass. |
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See link for a discussion of figure-8 orbits in KSP |
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For a figure 8 orbit, it seems inherently unstable
because when you go around the moon there will
be a gravitational slingshot effect. Depending on
which way you go it will either increase or
decrease the speed of the spacecraft. But if you
arrange the orbit to always gain energy from the
moon yet dissipate that energy going around he
earth using an aerobraking maneuver in the upper
atmosphere, maybe such an orbit could be
maintained. Using solar power, the profile of the
craft could be adjusted to fine tune the
aerobraking to keep the orbit stable. |
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Of course I have no idea if there is an orbit that
would meet all those requirements, how precisely
we can control aerobraking, and how much wear
and tear aerobraking has on a spacecraft. |
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The ancient Macs used to have a very fun gravity simulator: Gravitation. I recall trying to make figure 8 orbits, stable systems of 3 bodies orbiting each other, and the like. There is so much physics simulation magic going on. There must be a gravity simulator. |
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OOO! I just got a video game idea! |
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How about reference points/signals at L points. A
bit like a solar system test pattern. |
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// Orbital MeshNet: A series of tiny satellites that operate
as a mesh network with up/downlink to Earth, for use by
the public. // |
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Like an inverse SatNOGS (see link)? |
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// //the smallest feasible biosphere//
Main problem would be thermoregulation // |
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// small orbiter with radiation sensitive life in, surrounded
by a sphere of liquid water with an ice surface (mineral oil
coating to lessen sublimation) possibly some cyanobacteria
in the water and some CO2 creating stuff in the middle // |
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I envision a water-filled ice sphere cooled from the outside
and heated from the center by a small radioisotope heat
source (sufficient to keep the water at ~20–30° C), held in
place by a couple of thermally non-conductive tethers going
through the ice. The water would have bacteria and
whatnot in it, and sensing of their status would be done
using fiber optic sensors (to avoid making an easier path for
heat through the ice). Put some thermopiles on the outside
of the ice to make it an RTG, and back them with an IKECE
radiator. Fit the whole thing in a 1U CubeSat. |
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SatNOGS sounds interesting. I couldn't easily tell
from their web page whether this is just a
proposal, whether it was actively being
implemented, or was already functioning. Would
SatNOGS be effective for tracking an N-Prize
contender? It seemed to me that tracking an N-
prize satellite would actually be a large challenge
in and of itself. Even though I think I remember
that the cost of tracking is excluded form the
999.99 budget, it could still take a large bite out of
the prize money. It seems to me that a
distributed open source system might be willing to
donate a small amount of system time to an N-
Prize contender. If a transmission from the
satellite could be tracked as it transitions
between stations around the earth, perhaps, the
approximate course could be determined and with
a little bit of calculation of orbital mechanics it
could be verified that the satellite remained above
the minimum altitude for the required 9 orbits. |
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Just make sure you figure out a way to ensure
that the contender hasn't planted a radio
transmitter near each SatNOGS receiver under the
planned orbital path to spoof an orbiting satellite. |
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It's being built. The team recently announced they were
using the prize money to expand their goals too. (I think
they posted a project log entry about that; if not, there's a
post on hackaday.com.) |
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I'm not familiar with the N-Prize. I suppose it would depend
on what radios and antennas the ground stations are
equipped with. |
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//tracking an N- prize satellite would actually be a
large challenge in and of itself. Even though I think I
remember that the cost of tracking is excluded form
the 999.99 budget, it could still take a large bite out
of the prize money.// |
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It's not that difficult or expensive to track a small (N-
Prize weight) transmitter in orbit, as long as you
know roughly where to look for it; and we don't need
continuous tracking - just enough to prove orbit.
However, I'm assuming that if someone _did_ launch a
successful N-Prize entry, they wouldn't have much
problem in persuading amateurs (and probably some
professionals) to help with the tracking. |
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