++Fusion powered clippers, capable of speed > 300kps 10s of years. ++30000kps, 10%c, .1c if you can't travel at least this fast, don't bother going.! ---------------1. FUSION ROCKETS------------------- ++Fusion rockets, atomic nuclei expelled at 10000kps. then a rocket exhaust w/ that velocity can be produced, To reach 10% speed of light, a ship achieve 3x own exhaust velocity. 10000 ton payload in 40000 ton structure would require 1mil tons of fuel. ---------------2. PROPULSION SYSTEMS--------------- ++Nuclear pulse propulsion, beamed energy drives, solar sail starships, fusion ramjets, interstellar ion scoops, gravitation wormholes. ---------------3. ULTIMATE FUEL-------------------- ++Ultimate fuel - antimatter - system by making the technical jump from chemical power to fusion power, a similar jump from fusion to anti-matter will open up galaxy. ++matter is simply a form of condensed energy. E=mc^2. ++The mass in a penny contains more energy than 4 atom bombs. ++Anti-matter, as its name implies is an opposite form of matter. ++Combined masses are converted into pure energy - mostly in the form of gamma rays. ++Antimatter, we can fuel stars hips capable of approaching the speed of light. ++We want anti-matter , we will have to make it ourselves. ++Proton is accelerated to a velocity so high that its kinetic energy ++Producing an anti-proton when it collides . If a high-energy beam of protons is blasted into block of dense material, then about one in a million to one in a billion proton collisions will form an anti-proton. ++Anti-matter costs 300 billion dollars / milligram. ++Both matter and anti-matter can be forged out of raw space, if enough energy is focused on one spot. Producing electron-position pairs requires an electrical field strength of 2.4x10^18 volts/m^2. requires laser power on the order of 1.5x10^34 W /m^2. +Energy field must be maintain for only billionths of a second, and the power can be focused into areas not much larger than atomic nuclei. ++With gamma ray / cosmic ray lasers. 0.0001 angstroms, 10000-million times energy of xray lasers. xray laser 4x10^23 V/m^2. Cosmic ray lasers densities of 4x10^29 V/m^2. whole solar flares can tapped, and their gigantic energies funneled into anti-matter production lasers. ++Laser arrays could convert over 95% of the laser energy in electron/positron pairs. ++Anti-matter will simply be an intensely condense form of energy. ++With an abundance of anti-matter available, the stars will be within reach. Anti-matter reactions produce mostly pions (pi-mesons, a form of charged particles) moving at 97% of the speed of light. Confined in a magnetic bottle, controlled with magnetic mirrors, and exhausted through a magnetic nozzle, these fast-moving particles can form an incredibly powerful rocket plume. An ani-matter rocket with an exhaust velocity of 150000kps or higher, is a very real possibility. A single-stage rocket with this exhaust velocity could readily attain half the speed of light. ++It will probably be most efficient to use anti-matter in a dilute form, mixing it with a volatile propellant, like water. For velocities up to 30% of the speed of light, the most efficient recipe is to use 4tons of water /ton of ship, with varying amounts of anti-matter. For short hops, inside our solar system, these amounts are very small. A 1 ton ship could fly to the Moon in just 4 hours, using 4 tons of water and 30mg of antimatter. A 10 ton clipper get to Mars in 1 week, propelled by 40tons of water and 10gms of antimatter Sending a 1000 ton payload 4lt-year to the next star system at 10%c would require 4000 tons of water and 10 tons of anti-matter.