Advances here will inform the more scifi-ish imponderables like a space elevator, and asteroid- or moon-mining.
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And that really might just be the last piece of the puzzle we need to build that desired space elevator.
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Perhaps the most notorious of these ideas is the space elevator, which Clarke writes about in The Fountains of Paradise.
One reason NASA supports power beaming is that it hopes the technology could be used to help run a space elevator.
Laine believes that a Lunar space elevator would be much easier to construct than one on Earth, due to the lack of atmosphere and lower gravity.
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At the 2012 Space Elevator Conference, held in Seattle from August 25th to 27th, much of the buzz was around just such a flight of fancy.
The final price tag on a Lunar space elevator?
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Clarke have popularized the idea of a space elevator, there are still a few kinks that need to be worked out before we start having folks hit the "door close" button for a 100, 000 kilometer (62, 000 miles) ride.
ENGADGET: Space elevator ride may kill humans due to ionizing radiation
In addition to working towards building a Lunar space elevator, LiftPort also has its eyes on more down-to-Earth concerns, suggesting that its technology could also be deployed during emergency situations to help provide camera support to locate victims so they can be found and aided by responders.
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The latest problem, according to a new article in Acta Astronautica (we've really been meaning to renew our subscription), is that a space elevator would be so slow-moving (200 kph, or 124 mph) that the half-week spent in the Van Allen radiation belt would kill any living thing without proper shielding.
ENGADGET: Space elevator ride may kill humans due to ionizing radiation
While this technology still has a long way to go, challenges such as NASA's October 21 First Annual Space Elevator Competition at the Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley are spurring design teams to push the limits of both their robots and the super-strong, carbon nanotube-based ribbons that are key to supporting them.
Imagine being in an enclosed elevator accelerating up through space, he conjectured in one of them.
Researchers at the University of Michigan studying 172 research scientists recently found that when the scientists shared the same buildings and overlapped in their daily workplace walking patterns moving between lab space, office space, and the nearest bathroom and elevator they were significantly more likely to collaborate: For every 100 feet of "zonal overlap, " collaborations increased by up to 20%.
Accessed via its own elevator or a rather circuitous route through the hotel, the space seeks to evoke a grand New Orleans mansion.
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