Magnetic shell provides unprecedented control of magnetic fields.
60 replies, posted
[quote]I wonder if this could generate a sort of long-range magnetic sheath? If so, I think we've found tech that could be used in the barrel of a plasma rifle; in theory the magnetic sheath would compress and contain the burst of plasma long enough for it to hit the target before the shot ends up blooming and dissipating.
Even if it doesn't work for plasma weapons, it's still a pretty neat tech we've discovered. And if it helps with magnetic shielding against cosmic radiation, that's even better! [/quote]
[quote]I think I speak for everyone when I say; does this mean we're one step closer to lightsabers? [/quote]
Plasma guns? Lightsabers? You're reading an article about being able to control magnetic fields with precision and power, and your first thought is made-up weapons? Sci-fi authors make this stuff up wholesale because it sounds cool, and now when a new technology comes along everyone's thinking about how they can use it to try to make some bogus bullshit ray gun actually work instead of practical, realistic applications.
Try zero-contact frictionless motors, magnetically suspending their components in a vacuum and having no mechanical friction and torque limited only by how much power you put through. Or a magnetic sensor for finding shipwrecks on Earth or satellites in orbit. Or magnetic levitation in consumer products.
There are so many possibilities beyond trying to ape sci-fi. And plasma guns, of all things? The word plasma was chosen because it sounds cool, in real life it's about as practical as a gun that shoots steam.
IIRC Michio Kaku said that a plasma sword was possible (lightsaber)
[QUOTE=alien_guy;39106497]IIRC Michio Kaku said that a plasma sword was possible (lightsaber)[/QUOTE]
Is there a [I]point[/I] to a lightsaber? Like, any practical use beyond being the world's most hazardous welding torch? George Lucas made it up as a science fiction equivalent to a sword to fit a thematic purpose and help tell a story, what makes it a technology worth emulating in the real world?
I really don't understand why every time some new technology is discussed, there's always a contingent of people whose first thought is 'Yeah that's kinda cool, but can it make this thing from Star Trek/Star Wars/Mass Effect/whatever sci fi du jour?' It's incredibly... I don't know, petty? Short-sighted? Limited in imagination? And it's almost always weapons, too, as if we don't already have enough high-tech weapons to wipe the floor with the rest of the world.
Think about X-rays and all the uses we have for them now. Wouldn't it seem silly in retrospect if the first thing someone thought after hearing about their discovery was 'We should use these to make the ray guns from War of the Worlds'?
replace those antigravity magic metal plates with efficent fans/impellers with fricitonless motors from the controlled magnetic fields and you have a hoverboard that is actually possible
[QUOTE=catbarf;39106395]Plasma guns? Lightsabers? You're reading an article about being able to control magnetic fields with precision and power, and your first thought is made-up weapons? Sci-fi authors make this stuff up wholesale because it sounds cool, and now when a new technology comes along everyone's thinking about how they can use it to try to make some bogus bullshit ray gun actually work instead of practical, realistic applications.
Try zero-contact frictionless motors, magnetically suspending their components in a vacuum and having no mechanical friction and torque limited only by how much power you put through. Or a magnetic sensor for finding shipwrecks on Earth or satellites in orbit. Or magnetic levitation in consumer products.
There are so many possibilities beyond trying to ape sci-fi. And plasma guns, of all things? The word plasma was chosen because it sounds cool, in real life it's about as practical as a gun that shoots steam.[/QUOTE]
Even though I love Sci-Fi, I agree. Making something beneficial instead of coming up with some bogus weapon stuff would be quite more interesting.
[QUOTE=catbarf;39106810]Is there a [I]point[/I] to a lightsaber? Like, any practical use beyond being the world's most hazardous welding torch? George Lucas made it up as a science fiction equivalent to a sword to fit a thematic purpose and help tell a story, what makes it a technology worth emulating in the real world?
I really don't understand why every time some new technology is discussed, there's always a contingent of people whose first thought is 'Yeah that's kinda cool, but can it make this thing from Star Trek/Star Wars/Mass Effect/whatever sci fi du jour?' It's incredibly... I don't know, petty? Short-sighted? Limited in imagination? And it's almost always weapons, too, as if we don't already have enough high-tech weapons to wipe the floor with the rest of the world.
Think about X-rays and all the uses we have for them now. Wouldn't it seem silly in retrospect if the first thing someone thought after hearing about their discovery was 'We should use these to make the ray guns from War of the Worlds'?[/QUOTE]
[img]http://www.slipperybrick.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/trekcom.jpg[/img]
[QUOTE=alien_guy;39107411][IMG]http://www.slipperybrick.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/trekcom.jpg[/IMG][/QUOTE]
Yes, cell phones' flip-up screens were inspired by tricorders.
The difference is that [I]tricorders make sense[/I]. They're a logical, reasonable ergonomic evolution of existing technologies at the time, making communication devices smaller and more portable. And even then, nobody funded the development of cell phones specifically to fulfill a Trekkie wet dream, it's a technology that's practical and achievable, and it was only the flip-up screen concept that was inspired by Star Trek, not the concept of portable communications entirely. The development of cell phones wasn't because somebody thought it would be cool to replicate an unrealistic sci-fi technology.
That's on a whole different plane of existence from 'Let's try to build a plasma gun because Halo/40k/Mass Effect'.
[QUOTE=Eltro102;39105225]but what would contain the plasma after it leaves the gun and not make it superheat the air right in front of the shooter[/quote]
I'd assume that maybe the barrel of a plasma weapon could generate a "tunnel" using a rotating assortment of microwave beams aka masers, or even a maser that projects a ring-shaped beam, which ionises the air around and along the path of the projectile, which in theory would make it last a bit longer before it blooms out.
[QUOTE=Eltro102;39105225]what about firing a line of weak plasma and then firing a big electric bolt down the (very well conducting) plasma[/QUOTE]
That could work, although it wouldn't be a plasma gun in the sense of flamey bolts of fire. Technically it'd be a tesla weapon since it fires potent streams of electricity, though it'd still be a powerful energy weapon.
[QUOTE=ironman17;39108517]though it'd still be a powerful energy weapon.[/QUOTE]
No, it'd be a Taser, except using plasma to carry the charge instead of wired pitons. Electricity is not a viable weapon, the manner in which its conducted to the target doesn't change the amount of energy required for it to do anything useful. Thermal and electric weapons are much less efficient than kinetics, since they inflict damage by vaporization rather than disruption, and require a carrier to propagate which drastically limits usable range.
Guns are 'energy weapons'. They're kinetic energy weapons, and efficient ones at that. Electricity and plasma are technological dead-ends for weaponry; even lasers are limited to very specialized roles, and have enormous power requirements to produce anything useful. That's not just an efficiency issue which is a byproduct of the current level of technology, it's an issue stemming from the physical processes by which they operate.
I can't for the life of me understand why people bend over backwards to try to make plasma weapons seem plausible, and simultaneously embellish them until they're making pew pew noises and shooting big glowing blobs at people. A plasma weapon is a glorified heat gun, a super-sized blowdryer hooked up to a fusion reactor for some baffling reason. Even if you can handwave some magnetic bottling technology, the power requirement would be drastically more effective if put into a coilgun, particle beam, or just plain laser. Those are middlemen that work and don't require super-exotic power-intensive technologies just to shoot more than five feet.
There are [I]infinitely more useful[/I] applications for any sort of magnetic containment technology than a plasma gun.
[QUOTE=catbarf;39108874]No, it'd be a Taser, except using plasma to carry the charge instead of wired pitons. Electricity is not a viable weapon, the manner in which its conducted to the target doesn't change the amount of energy required for it to do anything useful. Thermal and electric weapons are much less efficient than kinetics, since they inflict damage by vaporization rather than disruption, and require a carrier to propagate which drastically limits usable range.
[/QUOTE]
[url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrolaser[/url]
~500mA of DC across the heart means death and that is not a lot of current
[editline]5th January 2013[/editline]
although yeah a magnetic containment thing has more applications than filling in sci-fi fans wet dreams
[QUOTE=Eltro102;39108952][URL]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrolaser[/URL]
~500mA of DC across the heart means death and that is not a lot of current[/QUOTE]
From an energy standpoint it's still extremely inefficient, and there are other problems, like how in order to function it has to use high-voltage low-current AC power, so getting enough power even to stop the heart is a problem. Having to use a laser to create a plasma channel adds more complexity and further increases the power requirement. At its core it's still a Taser, just with a really exotic carrier mechanism, and as you're probably aware scaling up a Taser to be able to kill someone with electric shock is a bit of an issue.
On the other hand, a directed kinetic-energy weapon using a disposable chemical energy power source puts very lethal holes in people every day. Presumably future technology in this field will be better.
Also, on the subject of plasma as a weapon, [URL="http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/Essays/PlasmaWeapons.html"]this[/URL] is a pretty good article explaining the basics of why it's impractical.
Like you said, weaponry should be one of the last things on our minds when we have this technological advances come up
but that being said
Isn't a rail gun, gauss cannon or coil weapon a better choice for weaponry anyway? it's way more efficient energy wise and is no doubt more lethal
anti-missile gauss cannons would be [i]the[/i] shit
[QUOTE=catbarf;39108874]No, it'd be a Taser, except using plasma to carry the charge instead of wired pitons. Electricity is not a viable weapon, the manner in which its conducted to the target doesn't change the amount of energy required for it to do anything useful. Thermal and electric weapons are much less efficient than kinetics, since they inflict damage by vaporization rather than disruption, and require a carrier to propagate which drastically limits usable range.
Guns are 'energy weapons'. They're kinetic energy weapons, and efficient ones at that. Electricity and plasma are technological dead-ends for weaponry; even lasers are limited to very specialized roles, and have enormous power requirements to produce anything useful. That's not just an efficiency issue which is a byproduct of the current level of technology, it's an issue stemming from the physical processes by which they operate.
I can't for the life of me understand why people bend over backwards to try to make plasma weapons seem plausible, and simultaneously embellish them until they're making pew pew noises and shooting big glowing blobs at people. A plasma weapon is a glorified heat gun, a super-sized blowdryer hooked up to a fusion reactor for some baffling reason. Even if you can handwave some magnetic bottling technology, the power requirement would be drastically more effective if put into a coilgun, particle beam, or just plain laser. Those are middlemen that work and don't require super-exotic power-intensive technologies just to shoot more than five feet.
There are [I]infinitely more useful[/I] applications for any sort of magnetic containment technology than a plasma gun.[/QUOTE]
You can't state that kinetic weapons will be the best weapons to use, simply because plasma based weapons are still sci-fi, and lasers are in their infant state. We will probably be dead before any viable plasma based weapon is constructed. It is silly to automatically think of weapons when a new technology emerges, but I guess that's how it is with us.
[QUOTE=Bradyns;39098089]Hoverboards! :v:[/QUOTE]
We have until 2015...
we are still a very primitive species.
[QUOTE=MrBob1337;39098033]Radiation shielding for spacecraft?[/QUOTE]
better
[img]http://gifsoup.com/webroot/animatedgifs6/2447274_o.gif[/img]
[QUOTE=Eltro102;39105225]but what would contain the plasma after it leaves the gun and not make it superheat the air right in front of the shooter
[editline]5th January 2013[/editline]
they think that some particles in a gas which is at negative tempratures would maybe possibly not be affected by gravity, so you still have to discover magic gas production and a way to actually use it
[editline]5th January 2013[/editline]
what about firing a line of weak plasma and then firing a big electric bolt down the (very well conducting) plasma[/QUOTE]
If you could fire a weak bolt of plasma you could fire a much larger one without the need for a pointlessly complex taser system.
[editline]6th January 2013[/editline]
[QUOTE=SpaceGhost;39113911]You can't state that kinetic weapons will be the best weapons to use, simply because plasma based weapons are still sci-fi, and lasers are in their infant state. We will probably be dead before any viable plasma based weapon is constructed. It is silly to automatically think of weapons when a new technology emerges, but I guess that's how it is with us.[/QUOTE]
Plasma would have limited uses, strap some ablative armor to the target and you've pretty much nullified any damage that a laser or plasma weapon could pull off, at least with the first shot.
[QUOTE=Matt-;39114182]we are still a very primitive species.[/QUOTE]
We are the most advanced known species. Primitive compared to what?
Late 2012 - so far Early 2013 has introduce a lot of new innovations, let's hope they are actually viable in some way.
(I'm just saying that not all discoveries prove to be economically and -sometimes after another discovery- scientifically viable.)
[QUOTE=Laserbeams;39115941]We are the most advanced known species. Primitive compared to what?[/QUOTE]
we're still fighting each other, we're not concentrating on scientific advancements, we still believe in gods, we still discriminate against each other. pretty primitive to me.
[QUOTE=SpaceGhost;39113911]You can't state that kinetic weapons will be the best weapons to use, simply because plasma based weapons are still sci-fi, and lasers are in their infant state. We will probably be dead before any viable plasma based weapon is constructed. It is silly to automatically think of weapons when a new technology emerges, but I guess that's how it is with us.[/QUOTE]
I for one thing this could be used to easily transport heavy goods (The gravity gun believe it or not has a real use, and it is possible to create one, albeit not the way it is in the game. The concept is a sound and useful application),and create connectionless suspension technology.
My inner gamer says promethean-like floating scopes, self assembling products, and radiation shielding. The latter is by far the most important to us in terms of space travel. Oh, most definitely.
[QUOTE=viperfan7;39098923]apparently things that are at negative kelvin can counter gravity sooo......[/QUOTE]
Fuck, isn't that a lot colder than the space between galaxies? I'm probably wrong
[editline]7th January 2013[/editline]
[QUOTE=Matt-;39117633]we're still fighting each other, we're not concentrating on scientific advancements, we still believe in gods, we still discriminate against each other. pretty primitive to me.[/QUOTE]So what you're saying is the human race entire is primitive because some people fight, some people believe in gods and not all of us are working on scientific advancement? Animals are primitive, we managed to survive a nuclear weapons dead lock for 40 years without either side pulling the trigger. I'm afraid I just don't like your negative outlook on humanity.
[QUOTE=RoboChimp;39117830]Fuck, isn't that a lot colder than the space between galaxies? I'm probably wrong
[editline]7th January 2013[/editline]
So what you're saying is the human race entire is primitive because some people fight, some people believe in gods and not all of us are working on scientific advancement? Animals are primitive, we managed to survive a nuclear weapons dead lock for 40 years.[/QUOTE]
Space is actually really really warm, like several thousand degrees kelvin in some places because of the flow of interstellar and intergalactic medium.
And any system that exhibits a negative kelvin temp acts like it's infinitely hot.
[QUOTE=Matt-;39117633]we're still fighting each other, we're not concentrating on scientific advancements, we still believe in gods, we still discriminate against each other. pretty primitive to me.[/QUOTE]
do i detect a hidden comparison to a fictional species
yay, science
[QUOTE=Matt-;39117633]we're still fighting each other, we're not concentrating on scientific advancements, we still believe in gods, we still discriminate against each other. pretty primitive to me.[/QUOTE]
Please give me an example of a non-fictional species for which none of that is true.
Humans are still amazing despite all our obvious flaws
[QUOTE=viperfan7;39098923]apparently things that are at negative kelvin can counter gravity sooo......[/QUOTE]
Sounds like scientists need to pull their socks up
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