Glasgow University Astrosoc presents 30 th Oct 2001 The Physics of Star Wars

Trinity School, Carlisle 20 th March 2000 The Physics of Star Wars

The 2nd International Philosophy, Science & Theology Festival Odyssey 2001 Grafton NSW Dr Martin Hendry University of Glasgow, UK The Science of Star Wars

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…

The Physicsof

The Scienceof

The Science of Star Wars Spaceships Weapons Droids and technology Planets and star systems

The Physics of Star Wars Spaceships Weapons Droids and technology Planets and star systems

“Travelling through hyperspace ain’t like dusting crops, boy…”

Interstellar Travel Speed of light = 186,000 miles per second = 300,000 km per second = 300,000 km per second Distance to nearest star = 4.3 light years, or 25,000,000,000,000 miles There are about 100,000,000,000 stars in our Milky Way galaxy

Einstein’s Relativity Matter causes space to curve or warp

Hyperspace “What time does Oxford reach this train?”

Hyperspace “What time does Alderaan reach the Falcon?”

Tatooine Alderaan

Tatooine Alderaan

Tatooine Alderaan

Tatooine Alderaan

Tatooine Alderaan

Tatooine Alderaan

The Runaway Universe Martin Hendry University of Glasgow

Dates for your Diary:- Wed 31 st Oct – PHYSOC lecture Room 257 4pm Wed 21 st Nov – Dept. Colloquium Room 222 4pm

Antigravity Gravity is an attractive force We feel weight when we are accelerated 1g = 10 metres per second per second

Anakin’s podracer accelerates from mph in 2 seconds: a g-force of about 13g

Death Stars Power needed to destroy Alderaan in 0.25 seconds = 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 MW This equals the total power output of the Sun for ~ 100,000 years

Power of the Death Star Laser pen = 1mW Light Bulb = 100W Electric Heater = 1kW Wind Farm= 1MW Lightning Bolt = 1GW Largest Laser= 1000TW The Death Star has the power of a million million million million million lightning bolts

“ ”Less clumsy or random than a blaster; an elegant weapon, for a more civilised age”

Lightsabres and Blasters Laser beams or plasma beams?

“ “We don’t serve their kind here!”

Droids Droids have a vital role in the Star Wars Universe, serving many different, highly specialised, functions, e.g.:- Astro-droids (R2-D2) Interpreters (C3-PO) Soldiers (Battle droids) Their presence often breeds resentment and mistrust

Communications C3PO and R2-D2 communicate through sound – no internet connections!! Droid army operated from orbiting Control Ship

Holograms

Navigation Finding your exact position in the galaxy is a huge computational task. Requires 50 billion Mbytes of disk space, or 77 million CD-roms years on a Pentium IV computer! (Also needs 3-D star maps of the galaxy) 3-D star maps 3-D star maps

“Well, if there’s a bright centre to the Universe you’re on the planet that it’s farthest from…”

Tatooine

Possible orbits of Tatooine, Tatoo 1 and Tatoo 2

Hoth

Endor

Yavin

Naboo

Coruscant

Top 10 Star Wars mistakes There’s no sound in space Laser beams can’t stop and change direction in free space If blasters can’t penetrate an energy shield then neither could radio signals The odds of successfully navigating an asteroid field are much better than The “galaxy” in Empire Strikes Back would be invisible Parsecs aren’t a unit of time Planetary cores aren’t liquid Life as we know it couldn’t live inside an asteroid The Ewoks Jar Jar Binks