/sci/ - Science & Math

>>3511635
Magnetic coilguns launching pieces of Phobosite away at extremely fast velocities, using solar or nuclear energy, slowly pushing Phobos into a polar elliptical orbit.

And this is my old Mars terraforming plan, my new one involves cannibalizing Phobos for massive orbital mirrors.

>>2800982
We totally can't also have the orbital mirror act partially as a photovoltaic power source for an artificial planetary magnetosphere

Captcha: magnetic. earting

>>2618880
>space-faring droids with inbuilt molecular mills and molecular assemblers latch onto Phobos/Deimos
>use the asteroid to make highly reflective material, shoot back toward robots orbiting Mars in polar orbit
>oh hey, if you keep reproducing robots to do this a massive orbital mirror could be constructed within 50 years easily.

Well, even I have given up smacking Phobos into Mars as CCM showed that hundreds of thousands of thermonuclear warheads would be required to shove it into any meaningful direction. However I have a plan sort of similar. It involves the use of molecular assemblers and the discovery/invention of a material that can withstand 3000'C for very long periods of time. The plan goes like this: droids and molecular assemblers begin mining some of Phobos and using the material to create a Mars-ward airscoop which over time will cause Phobos to lose it's speed. Depending on the width and tensile strength it could take anywhere from a few months to a couple of decades.

And of course there's the ever reliable plan of disassembling Phobos and creating huge polar orbit mirrors to add extra heat and sunlight to Mars that way.

>>2423894
>Future spacecraft might be powered by advanced engines that use plasma as a propellant. In that case, the discarded plasma could be recycled for use as a radiation shield. "You're protected by your own exhaust," Slough says.
FUND IT

>>2423897
>[Citation Needed]
http://bigthink.com/ideas/24011
>Answer: You are absolutely correct. Mars is a small planet, and hence it's gravitational field is not strong enough to permanently hold onto a dense atmosphere, but it is sufficient to hold onto an atmosphere for thousands to millions of years, which is enough for us. Once we terraform Mars, there will be enough of an atmosphere to take of all our needs for generations to come.
>More energy is required to create an artificial planetary magnetic field than is contributed by sunlight hitting the entire dayside surface of mars.
See pic
>So you're OK with the tons (lit) of material that rain down from space just sort of building on top of the shield, eventually making a second layer of soil and cutting off energy from the surface?
It's the goddamn future, cleaning droids can go out and fix that shit bro.
>The whole "hollow shells aren't gravitationally stable" problem notwithstanding, of course.
FUUUTUUUREE
>And you're getting the duraglass from?
Might be a material not yet invented.