What would your ideal vision of space travel in the near future be like?

Question

Some interesting plans for colonization or perhaps better faster propulsion that costs less money, any cool space visions would be awesome to hear about.

Answer 1

The universe is just so large, we need faster rockets. And the only way to achieve that is to rely on nuclear power. But first, we need to master nuclear fusion in a reactor.
Unless someone has a better idea on how to get faster still.

Answer 2

The Space Elevator thing is true. With the discovery of carbon nano-tubes they have finally found the wonder material strong enough to string from the earth to orbit. Only thing slowing it down now is the ability to mass produce the nano-tubes and manufacture a cable long enough to reach that far. The other snag is a vehicle that can traverse the cable(I've also heard it termed a ribbon). X Prize competitions are in play now for amateur builders to brainstorm and compete with the best designs. Once all that is figured out they will simply fly the cable up and attach it to a geosynchronous tether or counter weight. The spinning of the Earth will throw the weight out and keep the cable taut. It's slower than a rocket but once its done it almost free after that. No billions spent on an ailing shuttle and tons of rocket fuel. It goes up it comes down. Energy is supplied through the cable maybe. It's an awesome idea and exciting to think I will probably see it in my lifetime.

Answer 3

My dad's been working on a moon base project, scheduled 2020 - check it out!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/25/AR2006032500999.html

You'd need less fuel for propulsion with this scenario, because taking off from the moon means way less gravity to get through. Pretty cool! My dad agrees with some of the guys in the article, though, about 2020 being pretty optimistic.... they're so many more pressing uses for the money. Lots of engineers are probably going to need new jobs when Bush is out of office.

The coolest thing, I think, would be exploring other solar systems, and finding other life! Even if it was just fossils or something....

Oh, and I heard that some folks think it's possible that life could develop on a silicon base, instead of carbon. I would love for an example of that to be discovered in the near future, to see something so radically different...but I'm just dreaming with that one, I think.

Answer 4

My guess is that the real action will be in teh private sector. Right now its in the ery early stages--but looks very promising. If the entrepreneurs who are trying to establish a viable commercial space travel industry are successful, we may well see limited orbital tourism by the end of the next decade (limited in that it will still be very expensive).

But you can count on orbital manufacturing--at least to teh extent of smal pilot plants--to "piggyback) off this almost immediately. And--this is the really exicting part--that will set up a technical/economic scenario much like we've seen in teh early stages of other technologie--aircraft, railroads, electricity, computers.

The effect of this situation is to create a strong incentive for innovation and invention directed at cost reduction. The reason is that under these circumstances, each downward movement in costs opens up more and more markets (e.g., more people can afford to take trips, more and more products can be made profitably)--and you get a rapid drop in costs.

This analysis is a bit dry sounding---unavoidable--but it's solidly based on the history of technology and the economics of new technological sectors.

Here's the effect--let's suppose the first tourists have to pay $750-800 thousand for a trip on a next-generation commercial spacecraft (that is probably in teh ballpark). But a few years down the road (say by the early 2030s--25 years from now--that could easily drop to under $100 thousand. Still expensive--but not totally unattainable if you've got the determination and talent to put yourself in the top 20% of the population in terms of income and assets. And the manufacturing sector will open up more and more jobs in space.

Springboarding off this will be (at first limited) commercial efforts further ut--the moon, for starters.

Justto finish off--here's a paradigm shifter for you: I don't thing our first manned trips beyond the moon will be to Mars (though we'll go there--and sooner than a lot of people think). They'll be to Near Earth Asteroids. Some are in orbits that make them hard to reach--but there are already over 1000 known. Some are in easy-to-reach orbits (more or less)--andyou don't need a landing craft, etc. And the trips can be much shorter--a few mnths, even weeks! And besides scientific interest, there's a potential economic motive--these asteroids represent resources that could be mined to supply orbital industry more cheaply than lifting payloads of raw matierals from Eartn.

Hope this gets your imagination going! :)

Answer 5

I would like to see the use of solar sails to travel between the planets. There is a source of energy available in the solar wind that can be used throughout most of the solar system. The acceleration is limited but it is continuous and unlike rocket systems, there is no possibility of running out of fuel.

Answer 6

I’m a bit on pessimistic side, sorry. The world situation reminds that in Roman Empire. In third century AD they could build 6-storeyed houses; you could expect them construct 100-storeyed buildings in the fourth century; but for almost 1000 years they had been grazing goats in their main square Forum. And you know why!

Answer 7

Teleportation, Wormholes & Space Shuttles for transport.

Space, Moon and Planetary Stations where we can travel to holiday or live.

Cryostasis chambers where we're placed into a deep sleep while we travel long distances and dont age

Answer 8

Pl-eeease--I haven't even seen the entire US yet--much less Canada or Mexico---much less Europe or any of the other continents. I'm getting up in years, so would like to see as much of this earth while I can--later for the solar system and other planets.

Answer 9

placed it this way -- travelling on the speed of sunshine, it would want to take type of four years to achieve Alpha Centauri FROM the attitude OF AN OBSERVER on earth. in case you've been the only PILOTING the spacecraft, time outdoors the deliver might want to seem to decelerate relative on your own time as to procure in direction of the speed of sunshine -- so that you would possibly want to you, it would want to appear like the vacation in user-friendly words took a jiffy. as far as how briskly might want to a deliver bypass....your important limits are going to be how a lot gas you may carry, and how instantly you may boost up utilizing the gas accessible. in case you've been able to construct a deliver like the theoretical Bussard ramjet -- that could use an vast magnetic container to "scoop" ambient hydrogen from the close to-vacuum of area and use it for gas -- your gas provide might want to be effectively endless, and proper speed might want to ultimately be determined by technique of friction adverse to that mild quantity of hydrogen nonetheless in area. I examine once that physicists have calculated that proper speed to be about 60% lightspeed.

Answer 10

well something that will probably happen is that someone will invente a plan to be able to fly out of the atmosphere and into space. i bet in like 50 years going into space will be like going on vacation.