Cern Testing Superconducting magnetic shield for protecting astronauts in space.

home.web.cern.ch...

well that's that then.

really- they think these shields may protect against cosmic radiation and particle bombardment. if so it's a given that the lower energy solar originated radiation and particles will not get through either. this is one of those stinky problems that prevents mankind from taking over the solar system. a big one.

that just leaves, lofting large things into space from earth, impact protection, speed, power, advanced life-support and again, speed.

but still this is a biiiiig development if it works as predicted.

Prolly' more money should be spent on creating better prophylactics however, lets concentrate on the future….

They managed in 69 just fine

a reply to: stormbringer1701

Space elevator!.
Wow man is this like the thing in Star Trek? I forget the name?.

originally posted by: redchad
They managed in 69 just fine

because they werent beyond the VAB for very long in comparison.

a reply to: redchad

They managed in 69 just fine

Managed what? I thought the first man in space was Gagarin 12 April 1961.

ok; so this is good... but it could be better. once they prove it works then they need to switch from boron based superconductors to stanene. Stanine should be room temperature and thus should require no cryogenics and associated problems.

www.scientificamerican.com...

and they may have made it already:

phys.org...

Sounds like a good way to deal with the charged particles, however we'll still need a lot of water and other mass to act as an absorber for neutral particles. That's why we need to get started on space mining so we can build big up there and have the shielding needed for anyone seriously considering living up there.

well there are ways to turn any neutral particle which BTW is rare into a charged particle. the only truly immune to this are neutrons and more exotic (usually non interacting) subatomic particles. neutrons last only about 11 minutes when all alone before they harakiri and become protons electrons and neutrinos. 11 minutes is not long enough to get very far even at light speed. there would be for example none that could make it from the stars to bother us on earth. they have about three minutes to spare if they are generated at the sun assuming they are created with 99.9 percent c. really they travel a good bit slower than that so they probably go pewf before getting to earth.

It is not that i do not agree that we need to be able to put or build massive stuff like real spaceships or space stations in space. i certainly believe we need that capability. BADLY. but neutral particles aren't the reason. other than structural integrity and the need to not live crammed into a psychosis inducing sardine tin the real reason is impact protection. the faster you go the faster they do.

a reply to: TheConstruKctionofLight they crossed the van Allen radiation belt? To go to the moon Gragarin was only in earth orbit