German scientists have outlined a technique for using pulsars as an interplanetary and interstellar GPS system.
German scientists have outlined a technique for using pulsars as an interplanetary and interstellar GPS system.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
German scientists have outlined a technique for using pulsars as an interplanetary and interstellar GPS system.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Technology and real science finally catch up to science fiction again.
It would be great if they could get the whole system to work with a small array of simple cheap tiny CCD cameras and a good processor.
atomic time clock accuracy in deep space, indeed it would be a natural gps system!
Didn’t you have a recent post on the unexpected variability of some pulsars?
Yes, but the pulsars that suddenly change their rotation rate are rare, unusual, and easy to spot. The pulsars that would be used for this interstellar GPS technique are the more common variety pulsars, remarkably reliable and precise in their pulses.
Not to suggest that any pulsar is common. No matter what, these are very strange beasts in the zoo of interstellar objects out there.