starship-design: Antimatter

[wharton@physics.ucla.edu (Ken Wharton)]

Er... make that 230MeV per proton, not GeV.  That's a conversion of 10^12
mm microwave photons into each proton, not 10^15.  Still a bunch, tho...

As for antimatter, I guess the more energy sources the better.  Keep in mind,
though, that the result of antimatter annihilation is two photons, and
photons are the worst possible way to turn energy into momentum.

I guess my point was, though, that we don't need a second energy source (other
than the beamed energy) -- it's possible to convert the incoming energy
into a braking system.  So we don't need more energy; we need a way to
transfer it into 230MeV protons (or GeV alphas, or MeV electrons, etc., so
long as the kinetic energy is roughly a quarter of the rest mass).

Doing this on a huge scale, though... that's the tricky part.  And keeping
the forward beam neutral.  And a bunch of other stuff no doubt...

Ken