Humans in the future will need to develop a plan to move Earth’s orbit to avoid the predicted solar flare. Then the position of Mars is conducive to life.
In an article published in The Conversation, Dr Matteo Ceriotti – an expert in space engineering systems from the University of Glasgow (Scotland – UK), used to participate in bombing programs to alter orbits asteroids. , Defense of the Earth – analysis: Until one day we will have to move the Earth to a more habitable place – near Mars or move to the red planet itself, which will be a more beautiful and habitable place in the hot future of the solar system.
According to the latest studies, in a few billion years, our sun could run out of fuel and explode into a supernova, while devouring some of its closest planets, including Earth. Before this event happened, the inhabitants of Earth were forced to prepare in advance to deal with the extreme global warming caused by the changing sun, which could cause extinction.
The best option is to move our planet to another orbit where the existing position of Mars is the most beautiful. “We have been developing techniques to move small objects – asteroids – from their orbits for many years, mainly to protect our planet from impacts” – said Dr Ceriotti. But it cannot be applied mechanically to the Earth because it causes heavy damage to the moved object and the Earth is very large.
In fact, the Earth has been moved several times with very little impact, so we didn’t notice it. That is, when a probe left Earth, the launch sent a small pulse toward Earth in the opposite direction. With current technology, it would take 300 trillion of the world’s most powerful rockets, SpaceX’s FalconX, to propel Earth to Mars. However, we can hope for the advancement of technology.
The next option is to use “solar sails”, an option being explored to design sustainable solar motors for future planetary exploration spacecraft. It can be understood as a giant sail that captures the momentum of focused sunlight. However, we would need a sail 19 times the diameter of the Earth, “drifting” for 1 billion years with current technology.
In addition, the technique used by the famous Rosetta spacecraft to reach comet 67P in 2014-2016 can also be applied. It made two stops in the vicinity of Earth in 2005 and 2007. By applying the principle of two orbiting bodies to exchange momentum and change gears like a vortex billiard at the planetary level, Rosetta received significant acceleration for s ‘approach the target. If we repeat several times, using a spacecraft to impact the large asteroids, so that these asteroids replace Rosetta’s position every year, the mutual effect can gradually push the Earth out of its old orbit. .
The last option is to move all of our species to another planet, qualified to live in the exploding sun. “It doesn’t seem very difficult,” concludes Dr Matteo Ceriotti.