Related papers: Relativistic Light Sails
The process of cosmic ray acceleration up to energies in excess of $10^{20}$ eV at relativistic shock waves with large Lorentz factors, $\Gamma \gg 1$ requires $\sim \Gamma^2$ particle energy gains at single reflections from the shock (cf.…
A technique by which a spacecraft can interact with flows of ionized gas in space (the solar wind or interstellar medium) to be accelerated to velocities greater than the wind velocity is explored. Inspired by the dynamic soaring maneuvers…
Just as the ordinary Doppler effect serves as a tool to measure radial velocities of celestial objects, so can the relativistic Doppler effect be implemented to measure a combination of radial and transverse velocities by using recent…
Near Earth Asteroids have a possibility of impacting with the Earth and always have a thread on the Earth. This paper proposes a way of changing the trajectory of the asteroid to avoid the impaction. Solar sail evolving in a H-reversal…
The results from the Supernova Cosmology Project indicate a relation between cosmic distance and redshift that corresponds to an accelerating Universe, and, as a consequence, the presence of an energy component with negative pressure. This…
Recently, Hoang et al. (arXiv:1608.05284) reported analysis of the interaction of relativistic spacecrafts with interstellar medium (ISM, i.e. gas atoms and dust particles) relevant for the Breakthrough starshot initiative…
We study the horizontal transport of ultracold atoms over macroscopic distances of up to 20 cm with a moving 1D optical lattice. By using an optical Bessel beam to form the optical lattice, we can achieve nearly homogeneous trapping…
We investigate relativistic flows after a shock wave generated in a star arrives at the surface. First, the sphericity effect is involved through a successive approximation procedure by adding correction terms to an already known…
We present a physical-optics based theory of the physical mechanism for aberration of starlight. We apply non-relativistic and relativistic theories for wavefront image formation and include the effects of optically transmitting media…
We discuss the prospects for a progress to be brought by ASTRO-H in the understanding of the physics of particle acceleration in astrophysical environments. Particular emphasis will be put on the synergy with gamma-ray astronomy, in the…
In the Special Theory of Relativity space and time intervals are different in different frames of reference. As a consequence, the quantity 'velocity' of classical mechanics splits into different quantities in Special Relativity, coordinate…
Thanks to the availability of high-resolution high-sensitivity telescopes such as the Very Large Array, the Hubble Space Telescope, and the Chandra X-ray Observatory, there is now a wealth of observational data on relativistic jets from…
Faster-than-light or superluminal motion was originally predicted as a relativistic illusion of ballistic moving ejecta, and confirmed in a few tens of sources observationally. However, the recent results of the long-term multi-epoch…
The radiation pressure exerted by incoherent light on diverse surfaces is examined. The thermodynamic rule, first given by Carnot in 1824, describes the limitation to the amount of free energy that can be obtained from a source of thermal…
Relativistic spacecraft, like those proposed by the NASA Starlight program and the Breakthrough Starshot Initiative, will have to survive radiation production that is unique when compared to that experienced by conventional spacecraft. In a…
We construct an analytic model for the breakout of a relativistic radiation mediated shock from a stellar wind, and exploit it to calculate the observational diagnostics of the breakout signal. The model accounts for photon escape through…
The main benefit of an interstellar mission is to carry out in-situ measurements within a target star system. To allow for extended in-situ measurements, the spacecraft needs to be decelerated. One of the currently most promising…
The propagation of light in moving media is dragged by atomic motion. The light-drag effect can be dramatically enhanced by reducing the group velocity with electro-magnetically induced transparency (EIT). We develop a systematic procedure…
I show that the Reduced Speed of Light (RSL) approximation, when used properly (i.e. as originally designed - only for the local sources but not for the cosmic background), remains a highly accurate numerical method for modeling cosmic…
We present a method for measuring the Sun's motion using the proper motions of Galactic halo star streams. The method relies on the fact that the motion of the stars perpendicular to a stream from a low-mass progenitor is close to zero when…