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https://m.phys.org/news/2017-03-nasa-magnetic-shield-mars-atmosphere.html
In essence, they suggested that by positioning a magnetic dipole shield at the Mars L1 Lagrange Point, an artificial magnetosphere could be formed that would encompass the entire planet, thus shielding it from solar wind and radiation.
[...] In addition, the positioning of this magnetic shield would ensure that the two regions where most of Mars' atmosphere is lost would be shielded
[...] As a result, Mars atmosphere would naturally thicken over time, which lead to many new possibilities for human exploration and colonization. According to Green and his colleagues, these would include an average increase of about 4 °C (~7 °F), which would be enough to melt the carbon dioxide ice in the northern polar ice cap. This would trigger a greenhouse effect, warming the atmosphere further and causing the water ice in the polar caps to melt.
Pretty SF but I enjoyed the article.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 18 2017, @11:15AM (2 children)
You want to harvest energy from the particles you are repelling? Well that's easy, all you need is a perpetual motion device.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Saturday March 18 2017, @11:49AM
No, you don't need a PM. The device only needs to work as long as the sun provides a steady stream of charged particles. As soon as this influx of particles drops, youi'll certainly lose your energy source, but you'll also lose the problem which that satellite is made to solve (not that you wouldn't have to fight a lot of other problems in that case, but that specific satellite would no longer be required).
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Sunday March 19 2017, @02:14AM
> [...] all you need is a perpetual motion device.
I assumed readers were familiar with what I called "the aurora australis and aurora borealis." These are lights in the sky at high latitudes that are caused by, as I said, particles from the solar wind following the lines of the Earth's magnetic field and ionising atmospheric gas.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aurora [wikipedia.org]
The proposed satellite wouldn't have an atmosphere, so I would expect, as I said, some of the particles to strike it. It's those particles from which, I imagine, energy could be gathered. I didn't propose trying to collect energy from the particles that are deflected, although that would in theory be possible. There's a phenomenon called bremsstrahlung: when a charged particle is deflected or slowed, it emits radiation. Since the deflection would happen within a huge volume of space, the bremsstrahlung would be spatially diffuse and probably not worth trying to collect. It's not a matter of perpetual motion, however.
https://www.britannica.com/science/bremsstrahlung [britannica.com]
The particles that strike the magnetic poles of the satellite would give up their energy in a much smaller space. Making use of it might be worthwhile.