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U Glasgow Researchers Reflect on Asteroid Collisions

10/8/2007

By David Nagel

Mirrors aren't just for motel room ceilings anymore. Among their many other consumer and industrial uses, ranging from the application of cosmetics to the checking of the evenness of one's sideburns, they might also be instrumental in defending the planet from collisions with apocalypse-class asteroids, according to researchers at the University of Glasgow in Scotland.

The approach is something along the lines of Archimedes' death ray, in which an array of mirrors focuses sunlight on an object with the aim of setting it on fire. In the asteroid-deflection scheme, mirrors hanging around various parts of space would focus sunlight precisely on a tumbling, hurtling asteroid to melt its surface and create thrust that would edge it off its collision trajectory. (Those of you who are reassured by such plans probably shouldn't watch Mythbusters episode 16.)

According to reports coming out of the U.K. this weekend, the U Glasgow researchers, led by Massimiliano Vasile from the Department of Aerospace Engineering, compared nine different proposed methods of defending the Earth from extinction-inducing collisions. The mirror death ray plan beat out, among others, a plan for blowing up asteroids with nukes (on the grounds that pummeling the earth with radioactive asteroid debris might prove counter-productive).

The plan would require thousands of individual mirrors and could take up to 20 years to develop, just in time to divert 99942 Apophis, a massive asteroid that, according to current estimates, stands about a one in 45,000 chance of hitting the Earth in 2029. (For those of you working out your phobia priorities for 2029, that's about nine times more likely than being killed in an aircraft accident and 177 times more likely than being killed in a car accident, so ... uh ... sweet dreams.)

The findings were revealed at a Manchester University event celebrating the 50th anniversary of Sputnik last week.

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About the author: Dave Nagel is the executive editor for 1105 Media's educational technology online publications and electronic newsletters. He can be reached at dnagel@1105media.com.

Have any additional questions? Want to share your story? Want to pass along a news tip? Contact Dave Nagel, executive editor, at dnagel@1105media.com.

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David Nagel, "U Glasgow Researchers Reflect on Asteroid Collisions," Campus Technology, 10/8/2007, http://www.campustechnology.com/article.aspx?aid=51891

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