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The observation of micron size spin relaxation makes graphene a promising material for applications in spintronics requiring long distance spin communication. However, spin dependent scatterings at the contact/graphene interfaces affect the…
A new electrostatic ramjet space engine is proposed and analyzed. The upper atmosphere (85 -1000 km) is extremely dense in ions (millions per cubic cm). The interplanetary medium contains positive protons from the solar wind. A charged ball…
Laser-accelerated lightsails enable new types of missions that are very different from the Breakthrough Starshot mission to the Centauri system that aims to send 1 gram of payload at 0.2 c. The present work widens the mission design space…
Several recent works have proposed "stellar relay" transmission systems in which a spacecraft at the focus of a star's gravitational lens achieves dramatic boosts in the gain of an outgoing or incoming interstellar transmission. We examine…
At a distance of about 4.22 lightyears, it would take about 100,000 years for humans to visit our closest stellar neighbor Proxima Centauri using modern chemical thrusters. New technologies are now being developed that involve high-power…
Graphene and graphene-based materials exhibit exceptional optical and electrical properties with great promise for novel applications in light detection. However, several challenges prevent the full exploitation of these properties in…
Highly ambitious initiatives aspire to propel a miniature spacecraft to a neighboring star within a human generation, leveraging the radiation pressure of lasers for propulsion. One of the main challenges to achieving this enormous feat is…
Solar sails with the capability of generating a tangential radiation pressure at the sun-pointing attitude, such as refractive sails can provide more efficient methods for attitude and orbital control of sailcraft. This paper presents the…
A vector dual-wavelength rectangular-shape laser (RSL) based on a long fiber taper deposited with reduced graphene oxide is proposed, where the nonlinearity is enhanced due to large evanescent-field-interacting length and strong field…
We model accelerated trips at high-velocity aboard light sails (beam-powered propulsion in general) and radiation rockets (thrust by anisotropic emission of radiation) in terms of Kinnersley's solution of general relativity and its…
The application of directed energy to spacecraft mission design is explored using rapid transit to Mars as the design objective. An Earth-based laser array of unprecedented size (10~m diameter) and power (100~MW) is assumed to be enabled by…
The solar gravitational lens (SGL) provides a factor of $10^{11}$ amplification for viewing distant point sources beyond our solar system. As such, it may be used for resolved imaging of extended sources, such as exoplanets, not possible…
A new regime is described for Radiation Pressure Acceleration of a thin foil by an intense laser beam of above 10^20 W/cm^2. Highly monoenergetic proton beams extending to GeV energies can be produced with very high efficiency using…
Lightsails are a promising spacecraft concept that can reach relativistic speeds via propulsion by laser light, allowing travel to nearby stars within a human lifetime. The success of a lightsail mission requires that any motion in the…
Ultrafast electrically driven nanoscale light sources are critical components in nanophotonics. Compound semiconductor-based light sources for the nanophotonic platforms have been extensively investigated over the past decades. However,…
Scaling laws of ion acceleration in ultrathin foils driven by radiation pressure of intense laser pulses are investigated by theoretical analysis and two-dimensional particle-in-cell simulations. Considering the instabilities are inevitable…
Deciding on appropriate materials and designs for use in light sails, like the one proposed in the Breakthrough Starshot Initiative, is a topic that requires much care and forethought. Here, we offer a feasible option in the form of…
Solar sails enable missions to observe the solar environment from unique vantage points, such as sustained observations away from the Sun-Earth line; sub-L1 station keeping; high inclination solar orbits; Earth polar-sitting and…
Electromagnetic waves carry energy, linear momentum, and angular momentum. When light (or other electromagnetic radiation) interacts with material media, both energy and momentum are usually exchanged. The force and torque experienced by…
Upon entering a star system, light sails are subject to both gravitational forces and radiation pressure, and can use both in concert to modify their trajectory. Moreover, stars possess significant magnetic fields, and if the sail is in any…