[Report] EmDrive Microwave Propulsion Breakthrough Confirmed by NASA and Chinese Agencies?

[Warhippy]

NASA Scientists Claim "Impossible" Space Travel Engine Could Actually Work

August 1, 2014 | by Justine Alford

Photo credit: NASA/ISS. Aurora Australis and Airglow (NASA, International Space Station, 09/18/11). CC BY-NC 2.0

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While some may say that nothing is impossible, that is a word that has been frequently used by experts to describe SPR Ltd’s EmDrive. To some, EmDrive is crazy, junk science that will never amount to anything; however, its inventor Roger Shawyer has stuck by it resolutely and insists that this novel spacecraft propulsion system works.

EmDrive is a highly efficient propellant-less propulsion system that converts microwave energy into thrust inside a sealed chamber. Such a system would be a complete game changer in spaceflight; it could dramatically cut the cost of satellites and space stations, extend the lives of spacecrafts and drive deep-space missions. But there’s a problem- it violates Newtonian laws of physics, in particular the law of conservation of momentum. Critics have therefore claimed that any thrust generated by prototype systems tested so far must be coming from another source.

Despite supposedly being impossible, the work has sparked genuine interest in some. For example,

Chinese scientists have independently and repeatedly proven the theory of EmDrive. Just last year in fact, a Chinese team built their own EmDrive and confirmed that it produced 720 mN of thrust, which would be sufficient for a satellite thruster. This system could be powered by solar electricity, negating the need for a bulky propellant. However, the work was largely ignored and scientists were still far from convinced.

Now, the big boys in the field, NASA, have swooped in and tested the viability of a microwave thruster built by US scientist Guido Fetta. The results are in, and it seems Shawyer may have been right after all.

After eight days of work, which involved using a highly sensitive low-thrust torsion pendulum within a stainless steel vacuum chamber, the scientists were able to confirm that around 30-50 micro-

Newtons of thrust were produced. Furthermore, they were able to verify that the force was not generated by something other than the test system. While the result may be significantly smaller than those obtained by Chinese scientists, it’s still a positive result, which is impressive to say the least.

For physicists out there to fill their boots, the paper states: “Test results indicate that the RF resonant cavity thruster design, which is unique as an electric propulsion device, is producing a force that is not attributable to any classical electromagnetic phenomenon and therefore is potentially demonstrating an interaction with the quantum vacuum virtual plasma.”

According to Wired, that infers it may work by pushing against a cloud of particles and anti-particles that are continuously being produced and disappearing again. NASA has trodden carefully, however, by not addressing the physics of the system and instead solely focusing on whether it works, and that is what they did.

While Fetta’s underlying theory is very different to that of EmDrive, Shawyer claims that the thrusters operate along similar lines. Like Shawyer, Fetta also had a hard time convincing skeptics that the system is valid.

Working microwave thrusters have the potential to revolutionize spaceflight and while this latest research makes no promises, it’s certainly tantalizing.

Read more at http://www.iflscience.com/technology/nasa-scientists-claim-impossible-space-travel-engine-could-actually-work#DVKEVBgq6drreLfF.99

http://www.iflscience.com/technology/nasa-scientists-claim-impossible-space-travel-engine-could-actually-work

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Interesting if true. One of my favorite professors always told me that the things people always thought were science fiction were indeed science fact that hasn't been discovered yet.

I will attempt to link as many stories regarding this as there are some who like to doubt, but also because this is sure to engender significant discussion in some regard or another.

[Warhippy]

China Confirms the Development of Anti-Gravity Technology, Based on 'EmDrive' Device

posted by Mr. Black November 8, 2009

Its not hard to imagine that an advanced civilization, in their progress towards efficient space travel, would one day have the have technology capable of manipulating gravity itself. And indeed, the most interesting UFO sightings that occur here on our own planet - exhibit characteristics of advanced spacecraft that is capable of controlling gravity. Making right angle turns at impossible speeds and performing other gravity defying maneuvers.

Alien hardware aside, an independent UK inventor has successfully created an anti-gravity device that could one day power human spacecraft. Dubbed the 'EmDrive' it is an electromagnetic propulsion engine that uses microwave technology to convert electrical energy into thrust. It uses no propellant.

Roger Shawyer's experimental Emdrive could ultimately prove to be a breakthrough in propulsion technology. For starters, it makes possible vertical takeoffs with slow ascents and using very little acceleration. In a military context this is a huge benefit because currently ballistic missiles launched from anywhere on Earth can be immediately spotted from orbiting satellites. An undetected, silent delivery of a deadly nuclear payload is an obvious military advantage.

Above: Roger Shawyer's EmDrive

Other applications would undoubtedly be revolutionary for civilian transport. The flying cars that aeronautical engineers have been dreaming of could be soon realized.

According to Shawyer, "the technology is firmly anchored in the basic laws of physics." The key to the anti-gravity functionality of the EmDrive involves a resonate cavity filled with microwaves.

The Emdrive perked the interest of the scientific community just a few years ago when Roger Shawyer, the UK inventor, first came forward with his revolutionary idea.

China Confirms the Technology

His theory of microwave propulsion, which was first widely publicized in a New Scientist article back in 2006, was not surprisingly met with large scale criticism. "Outrageous" and "impossible" were the common themes of EmDrive proponents.

Now, only a few years later - Chinese researchers claimed they have validated the math, and are building an EmDrive of their own.

The Northwestern Polytechnical University (NPU) in Xi'an is currently manufacturing a thruster based on the Shawyer's microwave propulsion theory. "NPU started their research program in June 2007, under the supervision of Professor Yang Juan. They have independently developed a mathematical simulation which shows unequivocally that a net force can be produced from a simple resonant tapered cavity," said Shawyer in an interview with Wired Magazine. "The thrust levels predicted by this simulation are similar to those resulting from the SPR design software, and the SPR test results."

The NPU has confirmed that they have reproduced Shawyer's theory and are building a prototype.

Above: an EmDrive prototype in action

The amount of thrust produced by the current EmDrive is relatively small, but very significant. The biggest difference between the EmDrive and a traditional combustion tech thruster is that the Emdrive uses no propellant. As long as it has an electricity supply the Emdrive can keep going, perhaps one day traveling into deep space.

In fact, Shawyer calculates that a solar-powered Emdrive could take a manned mission to Mars in just over a month.

Claims of anti-gravity, free energy, and over unity devices are often met with harsh skepticism by the so called "mainstream". What makes Shawyer's theory exciting is that these initial skeptics have at least been partially put to rest as a result of the confirmation of the technology by the Chinese. The Emdrive has passed scientific analysis. Despite not fully understanding how it works they were able to measure the fact that it does indeed work.

The big question is this: will Shawyer be allowed to continue the development of his technology. There is indeed a cartel of oil & energy corporations that are not about to let their multi trillion dollar energy business model, a model which based on the production of fossil fuels and non-renewable energy, be interrupted by a breakthrough idea. And this cartel is notorious for stifling, intimidating, and destroying the lives of inventors who would otherwise be able to share their technology with the world.

Only time will tell - in the meantime the ARC is following the development of anti gravity technology in a quest for a deeper understanding - for the benefit of our website visitors, customers and private clients.

Links:
SPR Ltd (Roger Shawyer's Company)

Attachments:
Shawyer's original theory paper

http://www.alienresearchcorp.com/technology/anti-gravity/emdrive/china/

[Warhippy]

When Roger Shawyer first unveiled his EmDrive thruster back around 2003, the scientific community laughed at him. They said it was impossible, that it was based on a flawed concept, and couldn’t work because it goes against the laws of conservation of momentum. But somehow, despite all of the reasons it shouldn’t work, it does. Scientists at NASA just confirmed it.

Shawyers engine provides thrust by “bouncing microwaves around in a closed chamber.” That’s it. There’s no need for a propellant of any kind like rocket fuel. When filled with resonating microwaves, the conical chamber of the thruster experiences a net thrust toward the wide end. These microwaves can be generated using electricity, which can be provided by solar energy. In theory, this means that the thruster can work forever, or at least until its hardware fails.

Initially, the idea was met with criticism because it flies in the face of Newtonian physics, which dictate that no closed system can have this kind of net thrust. Shawyer, however, says that net thrust occurs because the microwaves have a group velocity which is greater in one direction when Einstein’s relativity comes into play. But can it really?

Apparently, yes. The idea was first confirmed by a group of Chinese scientists back in 2009. They built their own version of Shawyer’s thruster and were able to produce 720 milinewton of force — but even then, nobody really believed it.

Now, American scientists at NASA have given the EmDrive a go, and once again confirmed that it actually works. The test results were presented on July 30 at the 50th Joint Propulsion Conference in Cleveland, Ohio, and astonishingly enough, they are positive. The team behind the drive still doesn’t know why it works, just that it does.

“Test results indicate that the RF resonant cavity thruster design, which is unique as an electric propulsion device, is producing a force that is not attributable to any classical electromagnetic phenomenon and therefore is potentially demonstrating an interaction with the quantum vacuum virtual plasma,” the report reads.

Therefore, we’ve still got a long road ahead of us before we’ve got energy-harvesting self-propelled intergalactic spacecraft, but these studies (assuming they’re not flawed) suggest we’ve made a major breakthrough in space propulsion systems. With further refinement, microwave thrusters could drastically cut the cost of satellites and space stations, and potentially even make it possible to travel to distant planets, like Mars, in weeks rather than months or years.

Read more: http://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/nasa-confirms-impossible-space-drive-actually-works-revolutionize-space-travel/#ixzz39C8DpZcv
Follow us: @digitaltrends on Twitter | digitaltrendsftw on Facebook

http://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/nasa-confirms-impossible-space-drive-actually-works-revolutionize-space-travel/#!btm888

[Robongo]

US government has had this technology for quite some time. As one of your links stated , what do you think that the "UFO's" have been using?

[Ray_Cathode]

I was reading several years ago about a British wave guide specialist building a propulsion system within a sealed waveguide. Perhaps this came from that?

[nucklehead]

^ umm... antigravity anitmatter systems...duh

[Gross-Misconduct]

^ umm... antigravity anitmatter systems...duh

[theminister]

I've mentioned a few times in a few of these OT threads.....there could be some game changers in the near future. The state of humanity is far from decided, as bleak as it often seems.

In fact, I would suggest their frequency is increasing proportionally to our scientific knowledge, which is a logarithmic growth.

The unknown unknowns.

[Warhippy]

The other hotly debated propulsion technique is the electromagnetic variety which theoretically can deliver goods in to orbit using a ring a few kilometers in diameter but powered by almost nothing more than simple gravity and magnets. (and a ton of actual power usage to sustain the charge of course)

http://science.howstuffworks.com/electromagnetic-propulsion.htm

Electromagnetic propulsion could take us to the heliopause at a speed unachievable by conventional spacecraft.

Source: NASA

For decades, the only means of space travel have been rocket engines that run off of chemical propulsion. Now, at the beginning of the 21st century, aerospace engineers are devising innovative ways to take us to the stars, including light propulsion, nuclear-fusion propulsion and antimatter propulsion. A new type of spacecraft that lacks any propellant is also being proposed. This type of spacecraft, which would be jolted through space by electromagnets, could take us farther than any of these other methods.

When cooled to extremely low temperatures, electromagnets demonstrate an unusual behavior: For the first few nanoseconds after electricity is applied to them, they vibrate.

David Goodwin, a program manager at the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of High Energy and Nuclear Physics, proposes that if this vibration can be contained in one direction, it could provide enough of a jolt to send spacecraft farther and faster into space than any other propulsion method in development.

Goodwin was invited to present his idea at a Joint Propulsion Conference on July 8, 2001, in Salt Lake City, Utah. In this edition of

How Stuff Will Work, you will get to see just how Goodwin's electromagnetic propulsion system works and how it could send spacecraft deep into space.

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http://news.softpedia.com/news/NASA-Creates-Electromagnetic-Propulsion-System-Prototype-122124.shtml

NASA Creates Electromagnetic Propulsion System Prototype

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⌖ - A bais diagram of a linear motor

At the Space 2009 Conference, held this week in Pasadena, California, engineers at the American space agency NASA have revealed the fact that they have successfully completed the construction work on their first electromagnetic propulsion system. Rather than relying on a rocket, the new device is only made up of a linear motor and a ramjet engine. The team behind the project also says that this would be the first system to fly beyond the sound barrier using a ramjet engine, arXiv reports.

Although ideas related to this type of propulsion systems have been around for about 63 years, it was only in the late 1990s that officials at the agency started paying more attention to them. Using the linear method means that no rockets and solid/liquid fuel mixes will be needed again. Chemical reactions will no longer be the method of choice for delivering vehicles to orbit. Additionally, vast amounts of fuel will stop occupying most cargo space on even the largest rockets, which means that more advanced space technologies could be researched in the near future.

Essentially, in the new system, a spacecraft is tethered to a track or rail, and is then accelerated by an electric motor to supersonic speed. “Linear motors are basically electric motors unwound. There are two groups of coils and an aluminum plate goes inside the gap [between the coils], when you hit the juice you are energizing the coils and the inductive reaction of that throws the aluminum plate out of this motor,” Dryden Flight Research Center aeronautics and propulsion engineer Kurt Kloesel, also the lead researcher on the new project, explains the new propulsion system's properties.

“You are essentially propelling this vehicle along a track up to the point is [sic] disengages from the track and takes off,” GSFC flight systems integration expert Michael Wrigh, who is also the test manager of exploration systems, adds. “As you go faster and faster, getting towards the speed of sound, the drag goes up significantly, creating this shock wave structure on the vehicle. And once you pass the supersonic barrier the drag goes down again,” Kloesel says. Essentially, he shares, what the team is proposing is using an electromagnetic field to help the craft get past the supersonic barrier.

In laboratory settings, the engineers say, they managed to do this with bench-top models. They reveal that the new technology could, in a more distant future, be used in airplanes and automobiles as well, although they admit that this is still some time away.

================================================================

http://www.centauri-dreams.org/?p=1275

Deep Space Propulsion via Magnetic Fields

by Paul Gilster on May 22, 2007

The beauty of magnetic sail concepts — magsails — is that they let us leave heavy tanks of propellants behind and use naturally occurring phenomena like the solar wind to push us where we’re going. Solar sails, of course, do the same thing, though they use the momentum imparted by photons rather than the energetic plasma stream of the solar wind. And Cornell University’s Mason Peck is now suggesting another kind of mission that leaves the fuel behind. Instead of using the solar wind, it taps magnetic fields like those around the planets.

As we’ll see in a moment, we might one day use this method to send a fleet of micro-probes to Proxima Centauri. But let’s examine it first in light of planetary missions, which is what Peck has in mind with his Phase II NIAC study “Lorentz-Actuated Orbits: Electrodynamic Propulsion Without a Tether.” What the researcher is proposing is that a spacecraft can be made to accelerate in a direction perpendicular to a magnetic field. We know from Cassini images how the orbits of dust particles in Saturn’s rings are governed by such forces.

In fact, this ‘Lorentz force’ proves to be tremendously useful in the near-planetary environment. A spacecraft in Earth orbit, for example, creates a charge as it moves through the plasma surrounding the planet. The charge is minute, but it can be boosted either by emitting charged particles from a high-energy beam, or by using a lightweight surface (Peck suggests a thin, cylindrical wire mesh) to house a greater charge. Once charged sufficiently, the spacecraft will be deflected by the planetary magnetic field in a direction perpendicular to the magnetic field lines.

Jupiter’s magnetic field, containing fully 18,000 times the energy of Earth’s magnetosphere, would be ideal for this kind of work, offering plentiful opportunity not just for orbital adjustment but even for ‘hovering’ in place over a particular area to be studied (Robert Forward used to discuss doing something like this with ‘statites,’ satellites that would use solar sails to hover in Earth polar orbit or elsewhere). And imagine the increased payload that could be added to a Galileo-style spacecraft to Jupiter without the 371 kg of propellant that flew aboard that mission!

But the notion really opens up when you begin considering much smaller vehicles. Here I’m going to quote our own Larry Klaes, who wrote Peck’s work up for Ithaca (NY’s)’s Tompkins Weekly:

[Peck] notes that the concept might be ideal for small spacecraft. Cornell graduate student Justin Atchison is developing a satellite that is the size and heft of a single wafer of silicon.

“At this small scale, a spacecraft might be surprisingly susceptible to Lorentz force effects,” explains Peck. “But rather than launching just one of these ‘ChipSats,’ NASA might launch millions of them that would act as a swarm of very small sensors to detect life on another planet, provide communications, or serve as a distributed-aperture telescope many kilometers in diameter.”

As we move into the realm of ChipSats, Peck has my full attention. Take the ChipSat to its logical conclusion and you can envision thousands of tiny spacecraft slung out from the Solar System at ten percent of lightspeed to make the journey to the Centauri stars. “When these small craft arrive,” says Peck (I’m quoting from Larry’s story again), “they might send back a single, simple signal; one bit of information confirming or denying some scientific principle, such as is there a blue-green planet, for example.”

Peck’s completed Phase I study for NIAC is here, and you can read a precis of the Phase II project as well. Compared to solar sails or tether concepts, the Lorenz-Actuated Orbit (LAO) offers singular benefits. Peck writes:

“Electrodynamic tethers and solar sails certainly have their place. Tethers are convenient for deorbiting spacecraft in a passive way (i.e. without applied power). Solar sails work just as well, if not better, outside the geomagnetic field as they do near the earth. However, both suffer from the problem that the very large structures involved can deform under the action of the forces on them, reducing their performance. In the case of a tether, it appears that only gravity-gradient balance or spinning will help align a tether stiffly enough for it can raise an equatorial orbit in a mass-efficient way without buckling, tangling, or becoming redirected into a useless orientation. Solar sails are virtually impossible to reorient in an agile fashion. Our goal is to develop the LAO concept to the point where it is highly compact but offers the same propellantless benefits. The result will be an agile propellantless spacecraft. Even if the LAO spacecraft includes a long wire for capacitance, this wire will result in the same effect regardless of its direction. This significant advantage argues for the continued investigation of the LAO concept and suggests that it may prove more readily adaptable to existing mission architectures than are tethers.

You can read more about the concept at Peck’s site, and the issue of the Tompkins Weekly with Larry Klaes’ article is here. I’m also reminded of Robert Freitas idea of the ‘needle probe,’ an interstellar vehicle the size of a sewing needle but equipped with the nanotechnological tools to create an observing station out of raw materials it finds in the planetary system to which it is sent. Send not one or two but thousands of these for redundancy and you open up the nearby stars to minute examination. Will ChipSats offer a way to put instrumentation into Centauri space and beyond?

Addendum: I had originally referred to “Jupiter’s magnetic field, fully 18,000 times stronger than Earth’s…,” which Paul Dietz points out in the comments below is a mis-statement, as now corrected above.

[DeNiro]

But how can it make military weapons more efficient and deadly?

That's what we should really be asking ourselves as a species, right?

[theminister]

The Event Horizon, of the movie of the same name, used a gravity drive.

The theory was to focus a 'laser' of pure gravity at a point in space and pull them together negating the need for 'travel.'

It's proposed to be potentially possible, notwithstanding the amount of energy need to fuel one.

All we need is time to figure our crap out.

Whatever the human mind can conceive the human mind can achieve.

[theminister]

But how can it make military weapons more efficient and deadly?

That's what we should really be asking ourselves as a species, right?

I'm sure that US Space Command is all over it.

But now we know the Chinese can do it.

A new Space Race?!? God, I'd love that.

[inane]

Whatever this is, and however it pans out, it's still pretty freaking cool.

[ice orca]

Todays Tom Shawyer.

[Warhippy]

But how can it make military weapons more efficient and deadly?

That's what we should really be asking ourselves as a species, right?

Without war int he last 100 years we would not have

Penecillin

Antibiotics

X-rays

flight

computers

factory assembly lines

diagnostic imaging

cellular communication

space exploration

Nuclear power

I agree with your sentiment but aside from war, greed is the #1 reason inventions and advancements happen. It is a shame that this is the case but even in regards to the newly developed rail gun ideas, it will only lead to applicable entrance into other fields of advancement and research

[Warhippy]

I'm sure that US Space Command is all over it.

But now we know the Chinese can do it.

A new Space Race?!? God, I'd love that.

All we have to do now is involve some of the larger corporations as well and we will be on mars and on the moon full time within 50 years

[DeNiro]

Without war int he last 100 years we would not have

Penecillin

Antibiotics

X-rays

flight

computers

factory assembly lines

diagnostic imaging

cellular communication

space exploration

Nuclear power

I agree with your sentiment but aside from war, greed is the #1 reason inventions and advancements happen. It is a shame that this is the case but even in regards to the newly developed rail gun ideas, it will only lead to applicable entrance into other fields of advancement and research

We would likely be more advanced as a species if governments weren't so preoccupied with fighting "enemies" for finite resources.

Imagine what the world could accomplish if the US, China, and Russia worked together on these projects rather than fighting pointless battles as adversaries.

[theminister]

All we have to do now is involve some of the larger corporations as well and we will be on mars and on the moon full time within 50 years

I'd suggest, that if the technology is already this investigated and vetted, which it will need to be, then it will be almost Open Source.

It's not the basic principle that will be the intellectual property, it will the next generation of application.

[theminister]

Without war int he last 100 years we would not have

Penecillin

Antibiotics

X-rays

flight

computers

factory assembly lines

diagnostic imaging

cellular communication

space exploration

Nuclear power

I agree with your sentiment but aside from war, greed is the #1 reason inventions and advancements happen. It is a shame that this is the case but even in regards to the newly developed rail gun ideas, it will only lead to applicable entrance into other fields of advancement and research

Shoving each other back into the dirt as quickly as possible isn't a good reason for innovation.

It's actually a net loss of intellectual capital.

War on a grande scale is like what we lost with the introduction of disease to the Americas. Poof. Wasted.

[Warhippy]

We would likely be more advanced as a species if governments weren't so preoccupied with fighting "enemies" for finite resources.

Imagine what the world could accomplish if the US, China, and Russia worked together on these projects rather than fighting pointless battles as adversaries.

Shoving each other back into the dirt as quickly as possible isn't a good reason for innovation.

It's actually a net loss of intellectual capital.

War in a grande scale is like what we lost with the introduction of disease to the Americas. Poof. Wasted.

While I wholeheartedly agree with the both of you

Sadly this is not how our species works