Use Stellar Engines To Move The Sun And Stars!
181From what a Stellar Engine is, to how it could help change the universe as we know it! Join us as we explore how to move a star with a Stellar Engine!
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So you might be thinking right now, what exactly is a Stellar Engine? Don't worry if you're confused by its name and concept, it's a very "out there" idea, but one that could work in doing various things for humanity, including moving a star like our sun.
But you might be thinking, "is that even possible?" and the answer is...yeah, technically it is. Granted, it's something that would be very advanced, and by "advanced" I mean with technology that we don't have right now. After all, anything that would help move the sun is required to...you know...be AROUND the sun in order to get it to go anywhere? Which is why most agree that the notion of a Stellar Engine is one that is rooted deep in science-fiction at present, although the principles are rooted in science fact.
In fact, there are multiple models of a Stellar Engine that could theoretically be built if all the pieces fall into place, and their construction would be rooted in the world of...physics! These two versions are the "Active Method' and the "Passive Method".
The Passive Method is also known as the Shkadov Thruster, and it works a lot simpler than you might expect. I want you to think of the "thruster" as nothing more than a massive bowl that is placed "around" the sun. For a visual, think of a fruit bowl, with its semi-circular shape and its curves. That is one of the most important aspects of this method, because the plan would be to place it "around" the sun (more on direction later) and then let the suns' nature take course.
What exactly does that mean? It's simple, one of the reasons the sun stays in place more or less is because of all the photons it's emitting. While it's true that the sun is being pulled by the center of the Milky Way galaxy, the position that it's in relative to our solar system stays the same. that's why the Earth and the other planets don't get closer or farther from it.
The photons that it's emitting keep it in place. Which is great, as that helps keep our solar system stable. But if it weren't balanced? The sun would move out of position, and that's what the Shkadov Thruster would do. It would "capture" and then reflect the photons being produced by the sun, and push them back in the direction that we would need the sun to move. Basically making it a rocket engine without the need for manual ignitions or various other things, because the sun is going to be doing all the work itself!
Now, to be clear, while the Shkadov Thruster is a viable option (in terms of it actually being feasible within the laws of physics itself), there are a couple of things that would need to be done to make this thruster work...and it wouldn't be that easy even with advanced technology.
First off, let's talk about the shape of the thruster. I noted that you should picture a fruit bowl in regards to what the thruster would look like. And that's a good place to start, but if it was a true fruit bowl shape, it would honestly cause problems. Like what? How about reflecting the sunlight and radiation inwards towards the sun instead of reflecting it outward. This would cause all sorts of issues, including turning the star into another kind of star...and likely blowing up. So yeah, not good. So we would need the thruster to be in the shape of a parabola, that way it would reflect everything just right and not cause more problems that it could solve.
Second in terms of big problems is placement. If we're going to be reflecting massive amounts of sunlight and radiation out into the solar system. Can you tell me what the problem is with just putting it out in a random direction? The answer is that if we angle it the wrong way, the planets would likely be overwhelmed by the radiation and increased sunlight that is being blasted their direction. Just in the case of Earth, if we were hit by that, we would die more than likely once we get inside of its range.
So how would we counter something like that? The answer is infinitely simple, we just make sure we "point" the intense heat and radiation in a direction that won't affect the planets. Which is easy to do per se as planets all rotate on a circular axis more or less, and thus to not affect them, we'd just have to put the thruster "above" the sun so that the thrusters would be pointed down, and we can move without damaging the planets for the most part.
Now you might be thinking, "Wait a minute, if we do that, wouldn't we be limiting what we could do in terms of direction? Wouldn't we only be able to go in one direction?" And the answer to that is yes.