3:20PM February 12, 2011 | Annalee Newitz
To help humanity explore the universe and spread to the stars, we first need to escape the gravity well of planet Earth. The only way to do that right now is to ride a rocket – which takes an enormous amount of energy and money, especially if you want to send anything bigger than a mobile phone into orbit. Rockets are useless for the kind of offworld commuter solution we’ll need if we’re going to become an interplanetary civilization – let alone an interstellar one. That’s why an international team of scientists and investors are working on building a space elevator. Using very little energy, these 100,000km-high elevators could carry travelers out of the gravity well and up to a spaceship dock. More »
