Questions tagged [space-travel]
For questions about the process of traveling through space, including in orbit around a planet or moon. Consider also [spaceships]. See also the tag information (click "info") for more details on when this tag applies.
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Could asteroid mining be made viable if there were a resource rich asteroid in orbit just beyond the moon?
Two of the biggest issues with asteroid mining is the issue of actually getting materials from the the asteroid in question back to earth, and the relative abundance of resources on earth vs in space. ...
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Do the physics in this hypothetical space world work? What about space travel? [closed]
Basically, I have a solar system containing roughly twenty planets (though I can do closer to 10/15, if necessary). They revolve around a giant star at the center of the world. Does this work? What if ...
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What is the gravity above which launching into space is hindered? [duplicate]
I'm building a scenario where humanity meets an alien society with a technology comparable to that we have in the 2000's and beyond. Its technological level is comparable to ours. They have tapped ...
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How would time dilate for pioneers travelling to Alpha Centauri Cb?
Re: Relative Velocity Time Dilation:
Pioneers have travelled 4.2 light years to Alpha Centauri Cb in 9 months. Handwavium tech can transport mass in this timeframe. Upon their arrival to Cb, they are ...
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How would humans on Earth detect a Shkadov thruster on other side of the Milky Way Galaxy?
Apologies if the title is confusing - I've been trying to figure out how to word it for a while now.
Essentially I am writing a (relatively) hard science-fiction story set in the present/very near ...
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How would FTL travel based on tachyons most likely work?
So, I am trying to design an FTL system for my sci-fi setting. I find the concept of tachyons to be intriguing, and want to incorporate it into the system, but I'm not that familiar with how they work....
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Using a planetary flyby to reduce speed
At the end of my novel, the surviving crew of a spaceship is hurtling past a Dyson swarm that encloses the sun where the asteroid belt used to be. They are traveling too fast for orbital insertion and ...
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Is it possible to use thermal pumping for power generation in space? [closed]
There's this one component that exists in real life that uses the thermoelectric effect to pump heat, basically, by creating a temperature differential using voltage. Is it possible to use this in ...
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Is there any version of an ion drive, fictional or not, that would be able to create torchship-like acceleration for interplanetary travel? [closed]
Im trying to find a way to get a torch-ship up to some 0.x % of lightspeed with a ion-thrust like engine.
Let assume power is a non-issue, unless its becoming absurd (it makes no sense to propel a ...
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Would the discovery of a room temperature superconductor with a high critical current improve ion drives?
I'm just an optimistic, uneducated bum, so if any of the terminology or ideas are wrong I apologize. So I understand that ion drives are very economical but very low thrust. Partly because powering ...
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How to create a network of stable traversable wormholes, how those WH behave when interacting with gravity and vessels, and how they look [closed]
first time poster on the world building site, and I have several questions about wormholes and how they work. I've been reading through the other questions tagged "wormholes" and researching ...
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How much energy would you need to open a portal and maintain it? [closed]
How much energy would you need to open a portal and maintain it? And more importantly, what would the infrastructure look like?
For example: Would a single nuclear reactor be enough, or would you need ...
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What would the societal effects be, generally of inhabited worlds having time pass at significantly different rates [closed]
Thousands of years in the futures space was colonized, planets terraformed, history happening upon those planets and so forth. But it's not quite as was predicted, for in the initial foray of ...
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Is it possible to use the tech behind Project Daedalus as an asteroid defense system?
Assuming that all requirements are met, is it possible to use the gigantic Project Daedalus fusion propulsion to move large "Planet-Killing" asteroids at a meaningful pace, be it asteroid ...
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What would be easily missed, but undeniable, proof of life from non-advanced detectors?
I need a way for a spacecraft to detect absolutely irrefutable proof of organic, but not intelligent, life on a planet, most likely through spectroscopy or another similar concept. The spacecraft is ...
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