A group at NASA’s Johnson Space Center has successfully tested an electromagnetic (EM) propulsion drive in a vacuum – a major breakthrough for a multi-year international effort comprising several competing research teams. Thrust measurements of the EM Drive defy classical physics’ expectations that such a closed (microwave) cavity should be unusable for space propulsion because of the law of conservation of momentum.
EM Drive:
Last summer, NASA Eagleworks – an advanced propulsion research group led by Dr. Harold “Sonny” White at the Johnson Space Center (JSC) – made waves throughout the scientific and technical communities when the group presented their test results on July 28-30, 2014, at the 50th AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE Joint Propulsion Conference in Cleveland, Ohio.
Those results related to experimental testing of an EM Drive – a concept that originated around 2001 when a small UK company, Satellite Propulsion Research Ltd (SPR), under Roger J. Shawyer, started a Research and Development (R&D) program.
The concept of an EM Drive as put forth by SPR was that electromagnetic microwave cavities might provide for the direct conversion of electrical energy to thrust without the need to expel any propellant.
2015-04-19-005958This lack of expulsion of propellant from the drive was met with initial skepticism within the scientific community because this lack of propellant expulsion would leave nothing to balance the change in the spacecraft’s momentum if it were able to accelerate.
However, in 2010, Prof. Juan Yang in China began publishing about her research into EM Drive technology, culminating in her 2012 paper reporting higher input power (2.5kW) and tested thrust (720mN) levels of an EM Drive.
In 2014, Prof. Yang’s papers reported extensive tests involving internal temperature measurements with embedded thermocouples.
It was reported (in SPR Ltd.’s website) that if the Chinese EM Drive were to be installed in the International Space Station (ISS) and work as reported, it could provide the necessary delta-V (change in velocity needed to perform an on-orbit maneuver) to compensate for the Station’s orbital decay and thus eliminate the requirement of re-boosts from visiting vehicles. Despite these reports, Prof. Yang offered no scientifically-accepted explanation as to how the EM Drive can produce propulsion in space.
But NASA is downplaying the research and its potential to deliver a huge propulsion breakthrough in the near future.
"While conceptual research into novel propulsion methods by a team at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston has created headlines, this is a small effort that has not yet shown any tangible results," NASA officials told Space.com in a statement. "NASA is not working on 'warp drive' technology."
Not much information
The novel space engine design would seem to produce more energy than is put into it, violating the law of conservation of energy, which (simply put) says that energy cannot be destroyed or created.
"The reason it's controversial is, it violates Newton's Third Law," Brian Koberlein, an astrophysicist who studies general relativity and computational astrophysics, told Space.com.
It's possible that electromagnetic leaks in the chamber or coupling with Earth's magnetic field are responsible for the supposedly impossible result, said Koberlein, who is based at the Rochester Institute of Technology. But the recent test in the vacuum chamber, if it is indeed valid, does rule out another prosaic explanation — that the engine was pushing against Earth's atmosphere in some way, he added.
Outside scientists are understandably eager to know just what the JSC Eagleworks team has managed to achieve, and how they did it. But observers can't perform such an evaluation at the moment, because the work hasn't been submitted for peer review, said Koberlein.
NASA scientists have reported that they've successfully tested an engine called the electromagnetic propulsion drive, or the EM Drive, in a vacuum that replicates space. The EM Drive experimental system could take humans to Mars in just 70 days without the need for rocket fuel, and it's no exaggeration to say that this could change everything.
But before we get too excited (who are we kidding, we're already freaking out), it's important to note that these results haven't been replicated or verified by peer review, so there's a chance there's been some kind of error. But so far, despite a thorough attempt to poke holes in the results, the engine seems to hold up.
is it me or does it have the look of something born from the eighteenth century ? :D
or something to cook up an alcoholic broth in
good luck with it, however it looks
copper alloy look? :D
funbox
yikes .. guess i better brush up on my searching skills..sorryMerged with the original thread from 2015 8)
toss or merge if they're worth anything
I thought they had a jump room to Mars anyway.