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WGNNews.org Posted 7:52 A.M. October
25,
2005
NASA hosting space elevator competition
MOUNTAIN VIEW, CALIF.--Picture a ribbon stronger than
steel that stretches from Earth into orbit and acts as a kind of
space highway, on which robots transport materials back and
forth.
That is what scientists call the space elevator. And long
before it's ever a reality--if it is at all--scientists must
discover the materials, mechanisms and wireless power source to
make it work efficiently.
Considering it's no small feat
of optics, electricity and mechanics, NASA and the nonprofit
Spaceward Foundation are hosting the
first-ever competitions this weekend offering $50,000 to
teams with the best design of robot climber and ribbon. The
competition, to be held here at NASA's Ames Research Center, is
merely a conceptual demonstration of the space elevator.
"It's far out for us, but we're very interested in the
technologies involved," said Brant Sponberg, NASA project
manager for the "centennial challenges," a series of
government-sponsored competitions that support space
exploration. Sponberg was overseeing setup and tests of the
competition on Friday.
The "Beam Power Challenge," which will kick off Saturday at 5
a.m. PST, will test the design and efficiency of robot climbers,
machines that can ascend and descend a 50-meter tether ribbon
while carrying a payload.
Seven teams from the United States and Canada will get three
chances to climb the ribbon, having to travel at a minimum speed
of 1 meter per second. For each climb, teams get a score that's
a product of their payload mass and average velocity. The team
with the highest score will win $50,000.
Many of the climbers are powered by solar cell panels. The
Spaceward Foundation will cast a 10-kilowatt light onto the
solar panels, if used, to give the bots power up the tether. As
the ascent begins, the light will carry as much intensity as
three to four suns, but toward the top, its intensity will equal
only about one sun.
Steve Jones, an engineering and physics graduate student at
the University of British Columbia, said his climber needs the
equivalent of about two suns to make up the 50 meter tether.
He has been working on the team's climber for the last six
months, along with 14 other students. Jones said he was excited
about the competition because it isn't obvious how to solve the
problem. It's a mixture of optical, electrical and mechanical
questions that involve creating a climber, he said, and many
teams are coming at the problem differently.
For example, some teams are using solar cell panels, like
his, and others, like Starclimber, are relying on a Stirling
engine, which can convert heat into mechanical energy with an
efficiency of 30 percent to 40 percent, on par with a gas engine
and superior to photovoltaic cells.
"This is a great platform for sharing because it's very open.
We're seeing each other's designs, and it's accelerating the
rate at which we learn," Jones said.
The "Tether Challenge" is designed to help foster the
development of strong but lightweight materials that could
support the space elevator. The contest requires teams to
develop a tether that can improve on a commercially available
one by 50 percent in breaking force. Teams will compete in a
"pull-off," where each pulls against the other until one breaks,
to find the lightest and strongest. Finally, the best-performing
tether will compete against the "house" tether, or off-the-shelf
material, and if successful, will win the $50,000.
Most people believe that the space elevator will be made of
carbon nanotubes, but that technology is still in early
development.
"We're trying to use prizes to encourage development of that
technology," one project contractor for NASA said.
Published: October 22, 2005, 4:00 AM PDT
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