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NASA Unveils Centennial Challenges 262

Posted by samzenpus from the step-right-up dept.
wonderfesten writes "NASA has finally got its Centennial Challenges program off the ground. Like the X Prize, the Challenges award cash prizes to private inventors who come up with solutions to problems. The first challenges are to design a light-weight, ultra-strength tether and a means of transmitting power wirelessly. But with a prize of just $50,000, will anyone give it a shot?" Details also available on MSNBC and Space.com.
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NASA Unveils Centennial Challenges More

NASA Unveils Centennial Challenges

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  • Transmitting power wirelessly... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by slavemowgli ( 585321 ) * on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:02AM (#12034522) Homepage
    Transmitting power wirelessly is easy. Every signal, be it from a radio station, wifi, a cell phone or whatever, is a transmission of power.

  • Wireless power (Score:3, Funny)

    by LiquidCoooled ( 634315 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:03AM (#12034523) Homepage Journal
    Do not underestimate the power of a winnebago full of batteries.
    • Is that a Tannenbaum reference? "Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tapes hurtling down the highway" and all...

      --grendel drago

  • Space elevator? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by ag0ny ( 59629 ) <javi@lava[ ]ira.net ['nde' in gap]> on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:03AM (#12034524) Homepage
    The first challenges are to design a light-weight, ultra-strength tether and a means of transmitting power wirelessly.

    This has "space elevator" all written over. :)

    • Um'... makes sense why, too. (Score:5, Informative)

      by danalien ( 545655 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:24AM (#12034652) Homepage
      http://www.elevator2010.org [elevator2010.org] is one of http://www.spaceward.org's [spaceward.org] 'flagship projects'

      What's 'spaceaward'? "The Spaceward Foundation is a public-funds non-profit organization dedicated to furthering the cause of space access in educational curriculums and the public." [found in NASA's press release: M05-083 [nasa.gov]]

      • Competition rules (Score:4, Informative)

        by krysith ( 648105 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @10:20AM (#12035592) Journal
        Thank you for posting the real link for this story.

        To everyone who is positing various ways of transmitting power wirelessly, they already have a method in mind:

        Showcasing the first representative prototypes of Space Elevator climbers, this event will re-define public perception of the Space Elevator project by taking the first step away from mathematical models and drawing boards and into the world of real working hardware. By participating, you get the opportunity to partner in writing this unique chapter of history.

        The competition provides the race track, in the form of a crane-suspended vertical ribbon, and a strong light source to power the climbers. Competing teams provide climbers, which have to use the power beamed to them and scale the ribbon while carrying some amount of payload. Climbers will be rated according to their speed and the amount of payload they carried.

        The climbers (unmanned, of course) will weigh 25-50 kg [50-100 lbs], and will ascend the ribbon at about 1 m/s. [3 feet per second or 2.5 MPH]

        The beam source is a 10 kWatt Xenon search-light (80 cm beam diameter, about 25% efficient), which should yield a climber power budget of about 500 watts.

        The ribbon is roughly 30cm (1 foot) wide by 1 mm thick, is about 60m (200 feet) long, and is tensioned to about 1 ton.

        Building a climber is not an easy task. The designers have to juggle light weight structure, efficient photo-voltaic arrays, efficient motors and power electronics, low-loss traction mechanism, thermal management, and control systems.

        Not a walk in the park, but we'll make it worth your while. We will be offering $50,000, $20,000 and $10,000 to the 3 best teams.

        link:click here [elevator2010.org]

        The competition rules are at the bottom (pdf). Frankly, this sounds more like a college/high school technology building competition than an X-prize.
    • If it is a space elevator , then why dont they transfer the power through the tether , or is this another case of space age pen vs pencil

      • Re:Space elevator? (Score:3, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward
        or is this another case of space age pen vs pencil

        Hey, NASA used pencils as well. Pens are just better in that conductive fragments don't break off as easily. Also, NASA payed the normal retail price for the pens. The company that developed them did so for marketting purposes. They knew they could sell a lot of space pens by linking them to the space programme even though 99.999% of their customers would never use them in zero gravity.

        Just thought I should clarify. It's a bit of an urban legend an
      • Umm yea sure.. Imagine climbing a wire and trying to suck power out of it without tapping directly into the wire, thus damaging it. Yea sure it can be done, but you'd have the resistance of the 1,000 KM + wire to deal with and the limited amount of power drawn from the device. Or how bought a long wire run from the car to the ground which retract and lets longer as it climbs, great all we need is more weight!
        Current suggestions are Maser or Laser power. The technology is already there, honestly don't know w
        • Well i was joking but thinking about it , The tether could surround the power cable , and perhaps the tether could have holes through it , so that some form of cog or two could stay in conection with the power line as the elevator ascends ,so the line would be not much heavier
          i have a light fitting that functions like that , i know the projects may not be related though its intresting to think about .
          Thinking about it , it would be a nice way of doing it.
          I would hayard a guess that nasa are probably look
          • Yes, but the resistance along a wire that long would be huge especially compared to the minimal amount of power that such a device would be able to drawl. Then consider that the device needs to be made from a nano tubes which can transmit power, but I seriously doupt you could simply connect to them like you can connect to a normal wire by touch. And you don't want to add any more weight to the system than nessessary. Anyways as I said maser transmission is best for the system, hopefully we will get solar s
            • I should say thanksfor giving me a bit more backgrond to look into for this ( my electronic enginering skills are poor at best) , Solar power seems to be an excelent method for a device such a space elevator , And Maser technoligy sounds intresting I shall get to reading up on it ,
              ? Is there any significant dangeour , say if something intersected the Beams path
          • But if you had a power cord that wouldn't rip under it's own weight, you'ld already have the tether.

    • Re:Space elevator? (Score:5, Funny)

      by gr8_phk ( 621180 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @10:16AM (#12035550)
      I have wondered why the space elevator people want to use transmitted power. Why not just have your tether be a loop with a pully on the satellite? Then you just clamp a payload on and turn a crank on the ground. You get bi-directional delivery at the same time. Now there are potential issues with the 2 strands and associated payloads running into each other, but that seems like it should be easier to solve than all the issues with robotic climbers with beamed power.

      Oops, I should have patented this variation of the Space Elevator before writing about it....

      • Re:Space elevator? (Score:2, Informative)

        by clonan ( 64380 )
        perhaps because it won't work....

        A space elevator/ground to orbit tether is really a misnomer.

        It is actually a 120,000 KM long satalite that is in orbit around the planet. It just happens to orbit once per day.

        This is an incredibaly delicate system. THe mass has to be exactly balanced or your cable will get out of sync and start dragging on the ground...taking out cities in the process.

        The only way it COULD work is if you had a double cable attached at the peak...so each cable is long enough to reach
        • "It is actually a 120,000 KM long satalite that is in orbit around the planet. It just happens to orbit once per day."

          The cable is pulled tight by the satelite wanting to fly off into space. It's a bit beyond geostationary orbit, so it isn't actually orbiting in the conventional way.

          "The only way it COULD work is if you had a double cable attached at the peak...so each cable is long enough to reach the ground by itself."

          Running 2 cables up there would require each to carry half the load, and connecting

          • Re:You misunderstood (Score:3, Informative)

            by clonan ( 64380 )
            The cable is pulled tight by the satelite wanting to fly off into space. It's a bit beyond geostationary orbit, so it isn't actually orbiting in the conventional way.

            Not quite....

            Based on orbital dynamics:

            1. A single structure will orbit at the speed of it's center of mass.

            2. Only thoes objects that orbit at geosync. orbit (about 23K KM on earth) will remain over the same spot.

            3. Long object will orient in a radial manner through the center of mass of the parent object.

            THEREFORE:

            The cable is not held
            • "Based on orbital dynamics: 1. A single structure will orbit at the speed of it's center of mass. 2. Only thoes objects that orbit at geosync. orbit (about 23K KM on earth) will remain over the same spot. 3. Long object will orient in a radial manner through the center of mass of the parent object. "

              Orbital dynamics have little to do with a space elevator which is attached to the earth. The ribbon would stay tight even if there was no gravity. Think really hard about that for a moment. It works even wit

  • 50000? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by R.D.Olivaw ( 826349 )
    I think whoever can solve any of those problems can licence the invention for a lot more money! Or is this the new form of OSS (Open Source Science)

    • Re:50000? (Score:2, Informative)

      by bigtangringo ( 800328 )
      From TFA:
      Winners of those challenges would receive prizes of $100,000, $40,000 and $10,000 for first, second and third places.

      Congress currently limits NASA to awarding prizes of $250,000 or less. The space agency is lobbying lawmakers for the authority to increase the limit to as much as $40 million
    • Sure, sort of like how the subsequent licensing of SpaceShipOne to Richard Branson was worth much more than the X Prize itself. If anything, winning this contest will be worth more for the publicity than the actual money.

  • Ultra strength tether (Score:3, Funny)

    by imrec ( 461877 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:03AM (#12034528) Homepage
    Err... I got married a few months back. That 50 grand is mine soon as I tell NASA.

  • Gasp! (Score:5, Funny)

    by aendeuryu ( 844048 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:05AM (#12034539)
    Good lord! They want to combine a light-weight, ultra-strength tether with a means of transmitting power wirelessly. Read that again. A light-weight, ultra-strength tether with a means of transmitting power wirelessly. My God! Do you know what this means? Do you?!?

    Yeah, neither do I.
    • That would be funny if it weren't for the post some way back saying "this has space elevator written all over it"

  • I win.... (Score:2, Funny)

    by wpiman ( 739077 ) *
    "a means of transmitting power wirelessly."

    I submitted a one page white paper on using the Sun. I can't wait to get my $50,000?

  • Theodore Sturgeon (Score:2, Informative)

    by Himring ( 646324 )
    Wireless power -- first conceptualized (correct me if I'm wrong) in a short story, science fiction piece by Theodore Sturgeon [wikipedia.org] in his 1941 publication"Microcosmic God." [amazon.com] I read it in high school and it has been one of the most endearing scifi works I've read....

    • Re:Theodore Sturgeon (Score:3, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Nicola Tesla born in 1856 done a little on wireless power, so i very much doubt it was "conceptualized" as late as '41

    • Correcting you (Score:3, Interesting)

      by norkakn ( 102380 )
      Tesla ruined himself trying to make it practical
      http://www.tfcbooks.com/articles/tws8c. htm
      • this looks more like transmitting electricity through the surface of the earth,

        Wat Nasa wants is power through nothing, as in an external power source for let's say an aircraft

  • key paragraph (Score:3, Informative)

    by dlasley ( 221447 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:10AM (#12034570) Homepage
    Congress currently limits NASA to awarding prizes of $250,000 or less. The space agency is lobbying lawmakers for the authority to increase the limit to as much as $40 million. That would allow the Centennial Challenges program to set up competitions for more-advanced projects, like a human orbital flight.

    The longer the government stays involved in NASA, the less the chances of NASA having successful missions and regaining achievement through innovation and daring. As long as Congress holds the reigns (and the pursestrings), NASA will be hampered by inefficient bureaucracy and meddling from unqualified naysayers. The XPrize is proof that it's time for government to exit this area of scientific examination and for philanthropists and concerned businesses to take control.

    Just my $0.02, not counting inflation or exchange rates

    • Re:key paragraph (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      What? Maybe I'm picking a fight with the wrong libertarian but...

      Do you honestly think we would have had an orbital space flight, much less a trip to the moon without government involvement in NASA?

      Let's look at the major players in space - yep, USA, USSR, and now to some extent China. No government involvement in any of those!

      It's great to pull the government out of places where private industry can do better but are you sure private industry can do it better than the government now?

      I don't think pri
    • While this is true to a point you also have to remember NASA needs the government at the same time. While many see Space as "teh great beyond!" where Ewoks and Jar Jar binks live, Governments and (mostly) the US and UK, see it as "teh greatest battlegrounds evah!" in short. So the government is going to have alot more projects for NASA to work on.. secretly.. black projects.. So while NASA may like to give away more money, war (or future wars) will bring them lots of money where as "Lets go find Marvin and
      • Uh, I hate to break it to you, but NASA is a civil agency. They don't do military work, and they don't do "black projects".

        NASA does not have a monopoly on government space. The US Air Force does the bulk of the military work in space, along with the National Reconnaissance Office. The Navy also does a little. NASA has nothing to do with military systems such as GPS, DMSP, DSP, Milstar, DCS, TCS, Space Based Laser, SBIRS. They don't even help with the launch: the military has it's own launch facilities at

        • Well, you're right that NASA is a civil agency, but it most certainly does work on classified military projects. I know, I tried to get a job at the Advanced Aircraft Branch at Langley and was told that the security clearance would take longer than my duration there (semester during college).
          • Which has what to do with military work in space exactly? The original poster was trying to claim that NASA would be getting lots of funding for military work in space. I challenge you to name one NASA space mission (aside from the classified shuttle flights) that was military in nature.
    • OK, NASA is giving prizes.
      Does this mean that they will then own the rights? If so, why would I give something worth much more than $50K to them. So they can have one of their industry buddies "develop" it?
      Whether or not NASA will take ownership, I'll be better off ignoring NASA and patenting my stuff on my own.
      The prize only serves to provide free publicity.

  • 50k is 50k (Score:3, Funny)

    by sjonke ( 457707 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:11AM (#12034576) Journal
    And you know a wireless wall-power-level bunny vibe would have serious sales potential.
  • The early posts (and the submitter) seem to be missing the point... The $50k reward is just that - a reward. It's not like with the X Prize that the reward covered development costs. It's just an incentive - the *real* reward comes after you win. That's when you secure licensing deals, like Rutan did with Virgin.

  • NASA's Press Release (+inc. links...) (Score:3, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:15AM (#12034608)
    Here's NASA's Press Release [nasa.gov]

    -----

    Michael Braukus
    Headquarters, Washington
    (Phone: 202/358-1979)

    Metzada Shelef
    Spaceward Foundation, Mountain View, Calif.
    (Phone: 650/969-2010)

    March 23, 2005

    RELEASE: M05-083


    NASA Announces First Centennial Challenges' Prizes

    NASA and its partner, the Spaceward Foundation, today announced prizes totaling $400,000 for four prize competitions, the first under the agency's Centennial Challenges program.

    NASA's Centennial Challenges promotes technical innovation through a novel program of prize competitions. It is designed to tap the nation's ingenuity to make revolutionary advances to support the Vision for Space Exploration and NASA goals. The first two competitions will focus on the development of lightweight yet strong tether materials (Tether Challenge) and wireless power transmission technologies (Beam Power Challenge).

    "For more than 200 years, prizes have played a key role in spurring new achievements in science, technology, engineering and exploration," said NASA's Associate Administrator for Exploration Systems Mission Directorate, Craig Steidle. "Centennial Challenges will use prizes to help make the Vision for Space Exploration a reality," he added.

    "This is an exciting start for the Centennial Challenges program," said Brant Sponberg, program manager for Centennial Challenges. "The innovations from these competitions will help support advances in aerospace materials and structures, new approaches to robotic and human planetary surface operations, and even futuristic concepts like space elevators and solar power satellites," he said.

    The Tether Challenge centers on the creation of a material that combines light weight and incredible strength. Under this challenge, teams will develop high strength materials that will be stretched in a head-to-head competition to see which tether is strongest.

    The Beam Power challenge focuses on the development of wireless power technologies for a wide range of exploration purposes, such as human lunar exploration and long-duration Mars reconnaissance. In this challenge, teams will develop wireless power transmission systems, including transmitters and receivers, to power robotic climbers to lift the greatest weight possible to the top of a 50-meter cable in under three minutes.

    The winners of each initial 2005 challenge will receive $50,000. A second set of Tether and Beam Power challenges in 2006 are more technically challenging. Each challenge will award purses of $100,000, $40,000, and $10,000 for first, second, and third place.

    "We are thrilled with our partnership with NASA and we're excited to take the Tether and Beam Power challenges to the next level," said Meekk Shelef, president of the Spaceward Foundation.

    The Centennial Challenges program is managed by NASA's Exploration Systems Mission Directorate. The Spaceward Foundation is a public-funds non-profit organization dedicated to furthering the cause of space access in educational curriculums and the public.

    For more information about the Challenges on the Internet, visit:

    For information about NASA and agency programs on the Internet, visit:


    - end -

  • Tesla (Score:2, Informative)

    by malloci ( 467466 )
    Too bad they weren't doing this in Tesla's day [tfcbooks.com].

  • New prizes announced (Score:5, Funny)

    by DanielMarkham ( 765899 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:23AM (#12034649) Homepage
    With NASA trying to do too mnay things with too little money, I'd like to get in on the action as well.

    - $10 for first person to discover tenth planet
    - $15.75 for invention of anti-gravity device. Must include batteries
    - $17.50 for first person to deliver truckload of gold bullion to my house
    - $37.50 for proof of alien life

    I've got the money right here (pats wallet). Let's all not rush. Stand in line, please.
  • He tried something like it, had partial success with wireless power transmission: some link [pbs.org] though it seems you need the earth for it so will not work in space. Also on Slashdot before: try this [slashdot.org]

    I also remember reading in a Russian science and technology journal (Yiuniy Tehnik) in the early 90s, about a patent to have a huge solar array in space that would send the power to the ground as a microwave beam.

    • I also remember reading in a Russian science and technology journal (Yiuniy Tehnik) in the early 90s, about a patent to have a huge solar array in space that would send the power to the ground as a microwave beam

      You're getting confused with Sim City 2000

  • Wireless power (Score:3, Informative)

    by FirienFirien ( 857374 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:27AM (#12034676) Homepage
    Previous posters... sheesh. from TFA, we see that you need to beam power to a robot climbing a cable, being judged by the amount the robot is able to carry while going. Batteries and LCRs are probably out. They suggest directed microwave or similar, if any of you are interested.

  • A good idea for wireless power would be lasers (Score:4, Insightful)

    by imsabbel ( 611519 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:32AM (#12034696)
    Today, good ir lasers can get 60% wallplug efficiency (>99% quantum efficency and little outcoupling losses, plus little additional resistances adding to the bandgap).
    The main reason why solar cells are unefficient is that you have to gamble with the bandgap: set it too high, and you will lose to many low energy photons. set it too low, and all those high energy photons will lose all energy >E_gap as phonons/heat. So even an absolutely ideal Solar cell could only get a little over 25% or so efficiency with a backbody spectrum.

    But now take a laser and create a optimally tuned solar cell with a bandgap just a bit lower than the laser wavelenght. You should be able to get 20-30% total transmission efficiency at least, imho, after a little optimisation.
    That doesnt sound too good, but its not so bad compared to other ways to store and carry energy (batteries, ect).

    But of course, having solar power stations in orbit that beam down their power with lasers would make a lot of people very nervous, for very good reasons ...

  • Tesla allready did wireless power transmition (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    We don't use it nowadays because it is not "merchantable" - there still is no efficient way to prevent leeching, unpaid use of it. Besides, I am not sure about this, but perhaps his machines needed to work with longwave radio frequencies to accomplish standing waves in concentric double sphere ground-ionosphere resonator. His work on wireless power transmission seems only remotely related to our radio of today

  • money money money (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Turn-X Alphonse ( 789240 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:37AM (#12034725) Journal
    How do these prices weigh against NASA research costs? I wouldn't mind knowing if these are done "to enhance space travel and encourage developement" or if they are just to save a few pennies... anyone know?

  • $50,000?! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anita Coney ( 648748 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @08:38AM (#12034727) Homepage
    Does NASA realise you can make that kind of money by simply working?!

    • Re:$50,000?! (Score:3, Interesting)

      by turgid ( 580780 )
      Does NASA realise you can make that kind of money by simply working?!

      Maybe it's to stimulate young minds? When you're a teenager yet to go to University or College, $50k is a lot of money.

      The other thing is, some people will take part purely for the fun of it. If you had to spend money on hardware, $50k might help you recoup your costs, and may provide an incentive for the more economically-challegend amongst us.

      Offering a cash prize, however small, gets you in the news. There's no such thing as bad publi

      • The money behind the X-Prize wasn't the goal. Everyone in it simply wanted to be the first person in space not launched by a government. We all accept that'd be cool.

        The money behind the X-Prize wasn't the goal. Everyone in it simply wanted to be the first person in space not launched by a government. We all accept that'd be cool.

        But somehow I don't see designing a tether as being quite as exciting, in and of itself.
        • You're right.

          You're right.

          Somehow I feel I have nothing to add to the discussion except a petty attempt at whoring for karma.

        • But somehow I don't see designing a tether as being quite as exciting, in and of itself.

          Is there some reason it should be as exciting? The problem seems relatively simple and if you win, you get $50,000 from NASA. That sounds sweet enough to me.

  • My god, NASA are really runnign out of money. First, they can't afford to keep their two most succsessful probes going, now they can't afford to give out decent prizes.

    The sceptic in me wonders whether NASA may just be hoping no-one will bother, then when they go off in a few years time and spend a dcent few 100 million on the projects, they will be like "look we did what no-one else could again".

    After all, these days they are having problems stressing their usefulness to a US government itching to spend
  • OK, imagine this scenario:

    A satellite (or other relatively still object) is up in space. It has a large collection grid that is basically a peltier in reverse (heat makes electricity). Fire a laser from the ground at the grid. Boom, wireless power.

    Another model: A heat-pipe in reverse (a tank of water or highly boilable liquid with steam pipes turning a generator). Fire said laser at heating point. Liquid boils and turns generator. Liquid cools and returns to heating chamber. Boom, wireless power.

  • I have a good idea for a challenge (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Illserve ( 56215 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @09:13AM (#12034976)
    Someone who finds NASA a pair of balls should get $50,000.

    Ok, maybe I'm being too harsh, it's 20/20 hindsight on my part to think that strapping people to big tanks of fuel and lighting it on fire is dangerous. We were only able to figure that out after they started blowing up, so I maybe they're justified in freezing like a deer in headlights in light of the shuttle tragedies.

    • You aren't being too harsh. You're being an idiot.

      NASA has always been aware of the risks of space flight. So have the astronauts who went into orbit, as well as to the moon. Man has always taken risk (had balls, as you so delicately put it) to push the frontier a little further away.

      Just because the media has duped sheep such as yourself into believing that space is too dangerous and NASA needs massive reforms doesn't mean that the majority of people feel that way. That's one reason that there isn't a si
  • Wireless Power [solarelectricpower.org]
  • Done [slashdot.org]
  • Wake me up when they come up with a light weight ultra strength means of transmitting power *and* a wireless tether.
  • If NASA offered a major prize, say one, five or ten million dollars, it'd be both a sizeable chunk of their budget and something which might just produce far more results for the money than NASA itself does.

    It is therefore not a huge surprise to find the prize is paltry.

    I know there are plenty of people at NASA who'd encourage this sort of prize based competition and would want a large prize, because they really want space travel to get going, but the behaviour of an *organisation* as a whole is *not* th

  • Wrong direction (Score:2, Insightful)

    by curufinwe741 ( 854270 )
    It seems to me that questing for wireless power transmission is a waste of time. The problem with high-power microwave beams is that anything getting in the way would get cooked, same with lasers. The focus should instead be on miniaturization of power sources such as fuel cells, and maybe even miniature elementary particle power generators that harness the energy that permeates the universe on a quantum level.
  • How about the NASA challenge of just getting off the ground?

  • Honestly, I'm a little confised. I know people always assume beamed power when talking about the space elevator. But I also usually hear about the tether being made of carbon nanotubes [google.com]. And I know I heard about research in superconducting carbon nanotubes [google.com].

    Anyone wanna tell me why this isn't a promising direction of research?

    Anm

  • The solution is not wireless power (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Bruha ( 412869 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @12:31PM (#12036889) Homepage Journal
    Wireless power in many instances is easy but low powered. What the focus needs to be on is superconducting materials that enable us to make devices that require minimal power to function.

    Imagine a watch that took your body heat and with the right chips in the watch would convert that heat and power/charge the watch.

    The same could be said for any number of ways to get power somewhere. If things were ultra low powered then fiber optics could be used to power devices.

    That is also a reason I think seti faces a problem. Modern civilizations may be using superconductor tech that gives them virtually no ELM footprint past their local region of space. If we do find something more likely that signal will fade and eventually dissapear over time.
  • Why, just yesterday, I submitted my patents on devices for climbing light-weight, ultra-strength tethers, operating on broadcast power, such as laser beams.

    I already had a patent pending on "tethers or tethering-style devices or mechanisms which are light in weight, and yet simultaneously and concurrently ultra in strength".

    3) Profit!

  • More info (Score:3, Informative)

    by FleaPlus ( 6935 ) on Thursday March 24, 2005 @01:51PM (#12037808) Journal
    I submitted this story a couple of times yesterday, but it sadly wasn't accepted. Maybe it was too long or had too many links? In any case, here's a copy, which has a little additional info:

    MSNBC [msn.com], Space.com [space.com], and Wired [wired.com] report that NASA, in collaboration with the non-profit Spaceward Foundation, has announced [nasa.gov] its first two Centennial Challenges. The Centennial Challenges, inspired by the Ansari X Prize and DARPA Grand Challenge, are prize contests [elevator2010.org] seeking to stimulate private industry development [msn.com] of technologies relevant to space exploration. One contest is the Tether Challenge, for building the sort of super-strong tether needed to make a space elevator feasible. The other is the Beam Power Challenge, for creating a wirelessly-powered ribbon-climbing robot capable of lifting as large a payload as possible within a limited timeframe. The initial set of challenges in 2005 will award $50K to the winners of each contest. A second set of challenges in 2006 will award first, second, and third place prizes worth $100K, $40K, and $10K. It's hoped that these contests will further space elevator technology and help eliminate the 'giggle factor' surrounding them. Additional contests will be announced in the coming weeks, although Congress currently restricts NASA from awarding prizes of more than $250K; the agency is lobbying to try to get this limit raised to $40 million for future prizes.

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