Hot Wavelength

Chapter 56 (Transplantation 2): Sunshade

In November 2032, Liangguo Rocket City

Michael Max wanted to terraform planets as a "backup plan" for Earth, and his primary target was Mars.

For nearly two decades, he has developed reusable high-thrust rockets, electric vehicles, StarNet, intelligent humanoid robots, and even Mayan polymer clay with the same composition as Martian soil.

To Michael's utter surprise, the plan to use superluminal waves to heat the Martian core and restart the magnetic field turned out to be completely unfeasible!
Even more unexpectedly, the plan was abandoned not because Mars was at risk of exploding, but because Mars was a used and abandoned "steam engine" with leaks all over its body, making it impossible to heat its metal core to the required temperature no matter how much energy was poured in.

Even if Michael's Mars terraforming plan succeeds, and Mars restarts its magnetic field, with liquid water on its surface and oxygen levels in its atmosphere sufficient for life, it will still be very different from Earth and not conducive to human survival.

Mars is farther from the sun than Earth, and its climate is cold, so humans cannot enjoy the warm sunshine and beaches outdoors.

Mars has about one-ninth the mass of Earth, and its surface acceleration is much lower than Earth's, making people feel lightheaded when walking on it. This lack of gravity would cause human bones to elongate, leading to osteoporosis and various cardiovascular diseases.

The planet most similar to Earth is not Mars, but Venus. Venus is only slightly smaller in size and mass than Earth, and its surface gravitational acceleration is 90% of Earth's, making it a true sister planet to Earth.

Why not prioritize the transformation of Venus? Because it would be too difficult.

Venus is closer to the sun and receives twice the intensity of solar radiation as Earth. Its thick atmosphere, primarily composed of carbon dioxide, creates a strong greenhouse effect, resulting in surface temperatures exceeding 400 degrees Celsius. The immense atmospheric pressure is enough to crush virtually any existing man-made object.

The presence of numerous volcanoes on Venus's surface indicates that its core, like Earth's, is a hot, liquid metal. However, Venus has a very weak magnetic field because of its slow rotation and axial tilt of only 2 degrees. Unlike Earth, its liquid core does not experience violent rotation or shaking.

Venus rotates in the opposite direction to Earth, with a period of 243 days, which is longer than its orbital period. This causes the side facing the sun to be too hot, while the other side is very cold, making it difficult for organisms such as humans, who are accustomed to the 24-hour day-night cycle, to adapt.

Since the 1950s, a series of imaginative plans to modify Venus have emerged.

The solution to the problem of Venus's dense atmosphere causing high surface temperature and pressure is to drag the comet into impact with the atmosphere.

Another approach is to extract elements such as magnesium and calcium from Earth, the Moon, or other asteroids and release them into Venus's atmosphere. This would create a chemical reaction that produces magnesium carbonate and calcium carbonate, thereby reducing the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

The method to accelerate Venus's rotation is quite ingenious: drag an asteroid with a diameter of nearly 100 kilometers from the Kuiper Belt, which is 40 AU away, and have it pass close to Venus at high speed, thereby increasing Venus's rotation speed through collision.

Among the proposed plans for terraforming Venus, the most creative one actually stems from simple everyday knowledge: when the sunlight is too intense, just build a sunshade!
A huge reflector is built at the Lagrange point (L1) on the line connecting the Sun and Venus. This reflects the intense radiation from the Sun toward Venus back into space, reducing the energy absorbed by Venus and thus cooling and depressurizing it, thereby reducing the density of its atmosphere.

Unfortunately, all of the above solutions pose enormous challenges to human engineering technology and resources, and cannot be implemented for the foreseeable future.

For example, the scale and cost of building that so-called sunshade are beyond what current human capabilities can afford.

When Drs. Michael and James were researching Venus modification plans, they found that the sunshade plan was safer and seemed more feasible, but building the sunshade by artificial splicing was obviously not feasible.

This was no challenge for Michael Max, whose mind was full of imaginative ideas.

He suggested that since man-made ones wouldn't work, they should bring in a natural asteroid to block the sun and Venus, acting as a sunshade.

Dr. James reminded Michael that such asteroids are not easy to find. He affirmed Michael's reasoning for ruling out comets: comets are too low in density, mainly composed of ice, and the high radiation intensity near Venus would melt any ice shelter they could use.

There are at least 500,000 asteroids in the asteroid belt, and nearly 10,000 of them are larger than 100 meters in diameter, but the vast majority of them are composed of low-density rocks and snow ice.

Are there asteroids that are almost entirely composed of metal? Dr. Michael and Dr. James focused their attention on asteroid number 16, Psyche.

Psyche is the most unique asteroid discovered in the solar system so far. It has a diameter of 250 kilometers and is almost entirely composed of metals such as iron, nickel, gold, and platinum. According to Daphne's hypothesis, it was likely formed when hot metallic streams ejected from the core of Mars during its explosion cooled instantly.

Psyche has an orbital period of 4.98 years, an average linear velocity of 17.4 kilometers per second, and an aphelion velocity of approximately 12 kilometers per second. Currently, the speeds of various man-made spacecraft fall within this range, meaning that it's relatively easy for them to synchronize with Psyche. Launching a space tug to synchronize with Psyche, achieve docking, and even land on it are all feasible. However, towing Psyche to slow it down is impossible. This is because Psyche's mass is too great; a tiny space tug cannot tow a massive object like a whale.

Michael's plan to terraform Venus was thus shelved, but he showed great interest in the Psyche exploration project from the US Space Agency. Unfortunately, upon arriving at Psyche, the Psyche spacecraft suffered an unexpected circuit failure, and the project failed.

It wasn't until Michael came across Nikola Tesla's theory of faster-than-light waves that dragging Psyche seemed possible again. He and Dr. James proposed a completely new scheme based on a faster-than-light wave power station.

Multiple space tugs will be launched to land on Psyche, fixing multiple carbon nanotubes, each extending more than 18 kilometers into space to absorb superluminal energy. A power station that converts thermal energy into electrical energy will be built on its surface, outputting electricity to engines that can autonomously adjust the speed of Psyche.

After Michael and Dr. James reaffirmed the technical feasibility, they returned home and vividly recounted his incredible plan to Daphne.

Daphne suddenly realized why Michael was so interested in Psyche and the Psyche probe project she was involved in. After a moment's thought, she concluded, "You plan to use a superluminal power station to give Psyche autonomous maneuvering capabilities, achieving multiple goals at once: terraforming Venus."

Daphne counted on her fingers and said, "Phyllis is constantly slowing down, its orbit is getting closer to the sun, its eccentricity is constantly increasing, and it passes Venus at high speed and close range with each orbit, causing Venus to rotate faster."

“The orbital period of Psyche has been shortened from nearly 5 years to about 7 months. It will be able to stay stably at Venus’ Lagrange point (L1), reflecting and blocking strong solar radiation, thus becoming a sunshade for Venus.”

"As Venus receives less sunlight and its atmosphere cools, carbon dioxide will condense into acid rain and fall onto the surface of Venus, causing a decrease in atmospheric pressure, temperature, and atmospheric concentration."

Michael snapped out of his excitement, sat back down in his chair, sighed, and said, "I've never really cared about immortality, but now I really wish I could live another five hundred years!"

Daphne looked up in surprise and asked, "How did we end up here? You mean it will take a long time to terraform Venus?"

Michael shrugged and said helplessly, "Even if everything goes smoothly, terraforming Venus will take much longer than the original Mars project, possibly hundreds of years, or even thousands of years."

Michael was a man of action; he and Daphne arranged to meet with Eileen Petkova, who had just returned to Liang. Eileen's husband, media mogul Andrej, had passed away two months earlier, and as Eileen's friends, the two had originally intended to offer her their condolences.

Eileen remained calm, showing no excessive sadness; after all, Andek was already 100 years old and had no regrets. She warmly welcomed Michael and Daphne, saying to them:

“Andek passed away peacefully. Until his last moment, he reminded me to be aware of the risks of the Mars project. I am very grateful for the progress of science, and for the young man, Bharat, whom we all invested in, who used the method of rebuilding digital humans so that the legendary old man’s voice and smile can always be with us.”

Michael announced to Erin that he had abandoned his plan to build a superluminal power station on Mars, and she was so happy she almost jumped for joy, which was exactly what Andre's last wish was.

Michael didn't mention the Venus terraforming project. He asked Eileen somewhat awkwardly, "I know you've been researching genetic science. We've discussed stem cells, progenitor blood, and other methods that can extend lifespan and maintain health. Have there been any new developments recently?"

Eileen paused for a moment, then smiled and said to Michael, "Didn't you oppose the creation of drugs to prolong life? You claimed that death is what keeps young people innovating. Now you don't want to prolong your life and live forever, do you?"

Daphne chimed in with a laugh, "Michael thinks he's the chosen one, shouldering a great mission, so he wants to live a few hundred years longer."

The atmosphere of the conversation lightened, and Michael flicked Daphne's forehead with his finger as a form of "revenge."

He turned to Eileen and said, seemingly seriously, "You are a top biologist. What do you think are the main ways and directions to extend human lifespan?"

Eileen thought for a moment and said, "The aging of human tissue functions seems to be irreversible. Finding repair genes is one direction, but the direction I am most optimistic about is brain-computer interface, that is, combining carbon-based life and silicon-based computers. Studies have shown that the lifespan of the human brain is far longer than that of any other tissue or organ."

Michael fell into deep thought. The human brain, the machine-made body—living robots seemed to be the most feasible direction at present. It appeared that improving computing power, uploading consciousness, and brain-computer interfaces were the best ways to achieve biological and spiritual freedom.

“Even if I do live to be 500 years old, terraforming Venus is not something that can be accomplished in one generation. But in any case, iterating and upgrading computing equipment is the top priority!” Michael said to Daphne.

&
The poem composed of collected verses at the end of the chapter:
The crimson clouds covered the ground, forming heaps of red. (Tang Dynasty, Zhang Bi)
The sky is like a boundless mirror, where white birds return. (Song Dynasty, Fan Chengda)
Avoiding the heat and staying overnight at the Golden Palace, Tang Dynasty, Wang Jian
Human glory and decline come and go in quick succession. —Liu Yuxi, Tang Dynasty
(End of this chapter)