this post was submitted on 03 Sep 2024
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255
NASA's solar sail successfully spreads its wings in space (www.space.com)
submitted 2 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/19354798

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[โ€“] [email protected] 11 points 2 months ago (6 children)

If photon hitting a surface can impart momentum, does generating photons also impart momentum? Like, if you put a solar powered laser pointer in space, would it move?

[โ€“] [email protected] 19 points 2 months ago

Yes, it's called radiation pressure by emmision

The formula for it is Irradiance^1 of the emission/speed of light.

1: irradiance is basically how much power per unit area is emmited by the object, it's units are watt/m^2

As for the lasers thing, I'm not a 100% sure how effective that will be and TBH lasers are pretty complicated and I don't really get them

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