Timeline for In the shadow of a planet (science fiction)
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
10 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apr 27, 2016 at 5:45 | vote | accept | St0necr0w | ||
| Apr 27, 2016 at 5:45 | |||||
| Apr 27, 2016 at 5:44 | vote | accept | St0necr0w | ||
| Apr 27, 2016 at 5:45 | |||||
| Apr 23, 2016 at 9:43 | comment | added | Lensman | Well, that's what I get for basing my science on a 50+ year old science fiction story! :) AndyD273 is correct to note that a neutron star or white dwarf will have exploded sometime in its past, doing severe damage to its planets. But the question stipulates only a mining base on a planet, not a habitable planet. So we need only assume that some remnant of the original planet survived. If it was a large planet before the star exploded, that seems plausible. | |
| Apr 22, 2016 at 4:44 | comment | added | Jim2B | @Lensman, Andy is correct. A solar mass white dwarf might be Earth sized but a neutron star is much denser and therefore smaller for the same mass. | |
| Apr 21, 2016 at 14:26 | comment | added | AndyD273 | @Lensman Could be, though actually a neutron star would only have a radius of around 7 miles, much much smaller than the earth. I know neutron stars are the remnants of very large stars after a supernova event, and so I don't know what kind of planetary system would still exist naturally. A white dwarf on the other hand would be about the size of Earth, are still hot when they are new, and don't usually explode, though the expansion of the planetary nebula would probably kill any planet in orbit. | |
| Apr 21, 2016 at 14:13 | comment | added | AndyD273 | Right, though I don't want to assume that Sunshine got it right that just a reflective surface would be enough to protect the ship. You could use a heat pipe system. Some heat pipes have demonstrated a heat flux of more than 23 kW/cm², about four times the heat flux through the surface of the sun. | |
| Apr 21, 2016 at 3:46 | comment | added | Chloe | 4th/last paragraph, like Sunshine! They didn't use cooling, just gold foil. | |
| Apr 21, 2016 at 3:09 | comment | added | Lensman | SilverCookies has it right. Use a very small star, such as a pulsar (neutron star). If the star is no bigger than the planet -- and in theory, a neutron star might be about the same size as Earth -- then that works; the umbra would extend to infinity. As SilverCookies said, the extreme radiation from a pulsar would be an excellent reason for approaching the planet only within its shadow. | |
| Apr 20, 2016 at 16:07 | comment | added | Erik | Another approach would be some sort of wormhole navigation mechanism that drops you into the umbra. | |
| Apr 20, 2016 at 15:59 | history | answered | AndyD273 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |