Seminar Announcement

Abstract: All future NASA missions, all space activities depend on one thing, getting into space. Future human activities in space can be done only if they are done safely, reliably, and at a reasonable cost. Providing this access to Earth orbit and other planets on a grand scale is exactly the purpose of the proposed space elevator. In the simplest terms a space elevator is a cable strung from Earth to beyond geosynchronous orbit. In reality it would entail not only the cable but also climbers, power beaming, micrometeor impacts, dodging LEO satellites, atomic oxygen damage, seized climbers.

The idea of a space elevator is not new, actually building one is revolutionary in terms of current conceptions. The speaker’s past and proposed pragmatic approach to the design and deployment of a space elevator covers every aspect of the system from the raw materials to site selection and seized climbers.

Speaker Bio: Dr. Edwards became the Director of Research at the Institute for Scientific Research, Inc. in March of 2003. He is best known for his work on the Space Elevator, which has been enthusiastically supported by NIAC funding for the past three years. Last year he organized and helped to conduct the inaugural Space Elevator Conference in Los Alamos, New Mexico. The conference was successful, resulting in a second, larger, conference this year in September of 2003. The Space Elevator has been a topic of international media interest, and following are a few examples among the over 200 print, radio, and TV spots worldwide: A live interview on CNN, the cover of Science News, the cover of Ad Astra, the front page of Space.com, the front page of the Seattle Times, the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, and Wired Magazine. In addition, in 2003 he published, The Space Elevator, a book that explains the philosophy and the validity behind his technology.

Before arriving at ISR, he spent nine years working at Los Alamos National Laboratory as a Technical Staff Member. While at Los Alamos, he was involved in numerous missions including:
§ Leading multi-institutional Europa Ocean Discovery mission development program
§ Directing development of the world's first optical cryocooler ($1M+ in development funding from DOE)
§ Acting as Co-Investigator on ALEXIS (a soft x-ray astronomy satellite)
§ Developing a superconducting tunnel junction detector research program
§ Developing x- and gamma-ray detectors for space applications
§ Participating in the RULLI (low light imaging system) program
§ Leading the conception and development of missions for Lunar Scout, Discovery, and the Artemis lunar lander programs
§ Ongoing work included: proposing and managing experiments and development programs, computer programming, hardware development, basic research in several fields, and commercialization of technology