Toward directed energy planetary defense

Lubin, P. M.; Hughes, Gary B.; Bible, Jacob J.; Bublitz, Jesse; Arriola, Joshua T.; Motta, Caio; Suen, Jonathan Y.; Johansson, Isabella; Riley, Jordan; Sarvian, Nilou; Clayton-Warwick, Deborah; Wu, Jane; Milich, Andrew; Oleson, Mitch; Pryor, Mark; Krogen, Peter; Kangas, Miikka; O’Neill, Hugh

doi:10.1117/1.oe.53.2.025103

Cited by 54 publications

(49 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…Substantially different applications, crafts, or payloads may yield different results, as would launches in a substantially different gravitational environment (for instance, if used commonly for transport around an asteroidal zone). It is possible to use a high powered laser to move solar system objects, such as diverting asteroids for planetary protection (Lubin et al 2014) or evaporation and desorption of an comet's icy surface could produce a thrust to guide it into a planet (such as Mars, to produce lakes). 4.…”

Section: Power Beaming From Kic 8462852?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Power Beaming Leakage Radiation as a Seti Observable

Benford

2016

ApJ

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The most observable leakage radiation from an advanced civilization may well be from the use of power beaming to transfer energy and accelerate spacecraft. Applications suggested for power beaming involve launching spacecraft to orbit, raising satellites to a higher orbit, and interplanetary concepts involving space-to-space transfers of cargo or passengers. We also quantify beam-driven launch to the outer solar system, interstellar precursors, and ultimately starships. We estimate the principal observable parameters of power beaming leakage. Extraterrestrial civilizations would know their power beams could be observed, and so could put a message on the power beam and broadcast it for our receipt at little additional energy or cost. By observing leakage from power beams we may find a message embedded on the beam. Recent observations of the anomalous star KIC 8462852 by the Allen Telescope Array (ATA) set some limits on extraterrestrial power beaming in that system. We show that most power beaming applications commensurate with those suggested for our solar system would be detectable if using the frequency range monitored by the ATA, and so the lack of detection is a meaningful, if modest, constraint on extraterrestrial power beaming in that system. Until more extensive observations are made, the limited observation time and frequency coverage are not sufficiently broad in frequency and duration to produce firm conclusions. Such beams would be visible over large interstellar distances. This implies a new approach to the SETI search: instead of focusing on narrowband beacon transmissions generated by another civilization, look for more powerful beams with much wider bandwidth. This requires a new approach for their discovery by telescopes on Earth. Further studies of power beaming applications should be performed, potentially broadening the parameter space of the observable features that we have discussed here.

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Section: Power Beaming From Kic 8462852?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Power Beaming Leakage Radiation as a Seti Observable

Benford

2016

ApJ

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“…Degradation in the spatial beam quality, for instance, is often a notorious signal indicating the onset of severe thermal effects in the laser gain medium that ultimately limit the power range. Mitigation of thermal and other nonlinear effects is currently the subject of major research efforts aimed at developing practical high power lasers, which are preferably electrically pumped and solid‐state and that address a range of large‐scale applications in areas such as particle acceleration, security and defense, clean energy and in space propulsion . The most prominent strategies used so far have involved drawing on the advantages obtained from the geometry of the active medium (slab, fibre, thin disk), by exploiting the enhanced material properties at cryogenic temperatures, and through combination of beams from multiple separate lasers.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Diamond‐based concept for combining beams at very high average powers

McKay

Spence

Coutts

et al. 2017

Laser & Photonics Reviews

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Ever since the laser's invention, there has been great interest in increasing beam output power without detriment to its coherence. Despite great advances having been obtained through the use of a diverse range of approaches, steady‐state beam powers above ten kilowatts remain a significant challenge for solid‐state lasers due to the heightened impact of detrimental nonlinear effects such as thermal lensing. Multiplexing several lasers using beam combination represents a method for surpassing the power barriers of single lasers. Here we propose and demonstrate a novel approach to beam combination and power scaling based on Raman conversion in diamond. Power from multiple non‐collinear pump beams is efficiently transferred onto a single Stokes beam in a single‐pass amplifier. Using three mutually‐independent nanosecond pulsed beams from a free‐running‐linewidth 1064 nm laser, 69% of the total peak pump power of 6.7 kW was transferred onto a TEM00 Stokes seed pulse at 1240 nm in a 9.5 mm long diamond crystal. Compared to other beam combination techniques, diamond beam combination has advantages of relaxed constraints on pump beam mutual coherence, while enabling narrowband output. Thermal considerations for extending from low duty‐cycle to continuous wave operation and higher power levels are discussed.

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“…The smaller ("lite") stand-on system (called DE-STARLITE) involves a laser being physically delivered to the target. The laser technology is described in much greater detail in Lubin et al (2013), Kosmo et al (2014) and Lubin et al (2014). Effects of asteroid rotation are discussed in Johansson et al (2014) and optical modeling is discussed in Hughes et al (2013) and Hughes et al (2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In Lubin et al (2014), Johansson et al (2014) and Lubin et al (2013), simulations are performed with the high temperature materials expected in rocky target that require the highest flux and the low temperature volatiles in comets that can also be deflected with much less flux. This paper assumes a conversion factor of 100 µN · W −1 , as expected from thermal simulations and measurements, in orbital simulations of various NEO deflection scenarios.…”

Section: Laser Ablation Of An Object's Surfacementioning

confidence: 99%

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Orbital Simulations on Deflecting Near-Earth Objects by Directed Energy

Zhang

Walsh

Melis

et al. 2016

PASP

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Laser ablation of a Near-Earth Object (NEO) on a collision course with Earth produces a cloud of ejecta which exerts a thrust on the NEO, deflecting it from its original trajectory. Ablation may be performed from afar by illuminating an Earth-targeting asteroid or comet with a stand-off "DE-STAR" system consisting of a large phased-array laser in Earth orbit. Alternatively, a much smaller stand-on "DE-STARLITE" system may travel alongside the target, slowly deflecting it from nearby over a long period. This paper presents orbital simulations comparing the effectiveness of both systems across a range of laser and NEO parameters. Simulated parameters include magnitude, duration and, for the stand-on system, direction of the thrust, as well as the type, size and orbital characteristics of the target NEO. These simulations indicate that deflection distance is approximately proportional to the magnitude of thrust and to the square of the duration of ablation, and is inversely proportional to the mass. Furthermore, deflection distance shows strong dependence on thrust direction with the optimal direction of thrust varying with the duration of laser activity. As one example, consider a typical 325 m asteroid: beginning 15 yr in advance, just 2 N of thrust from a ∼ 20 kW stand-on DE-STARLITE system is sufficient to deflect the asteroid by 2 R ⊕ . Numerous scenarios are discussed as is a practical implementation of such a system consistent with current launch vehicle capabilities.

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Toward directed energy planetary defense

Cited by 54 publications

References 11 publications

Power Beaming Leakage Radiation as a Seti Observable

Power Beaming Leakage Radiation as a Seti Observable

Diamond‐based concept for combining beams at very high average powers

Orbital Simulations on Deflecting Near-Earth Objects by Directed Energy

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