<story><title>New nuclear deflection simulations advance planetary defense against asteroids</title><url>https://www.llnl.gov/article/50716/new-nuclear-deflection-simulations-advance-planetary-defense-against-asteroid-threats</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>spenczar5</author><text>So, this research is extremely cool. The way nuclear deflection works is not how you think. You probably don’t blast the rock to bits. Instead, Burkey’s model uses a bomb tunes to produce a crazy amount of x-ray radiation which heats up one side of the asteroid. You heat it up so much that the rock liquifies, then bubbles, and outgasses - and forms a propulsive engine, right on the surface, shooting out gaseous ultra-hot rock.&lt;p&gt;Newton’s third law kicks in: as the asteroid ejects mass in one direction, the asteroid reacts by going the opposite way. So you have altered the orbital trajectory of the asteroid, averting disaster.&lt;p&gt;The whole approach is very sensitive to the detonation height, asteroid composition and color, rotational characteristics, etc. So Burkey’s group has really made a simulation framework for modeling the right thing to do for a given asteroid.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>lr1970</author><text>&amp;gt; The whole approach is very sensitive to the detonation height, asteroid composition and color, rotational characteristics, etc. So Burkey’s group has really made a simulation framework for modeling the right thing to do for a given asteroid.&lt;p&gt;And don&amp;#x27;t forget that most asteroids are spinning over its own center-of-mass. The thrust generated by evaporating rocks on one of its sides will be changing direction as the asteroid spins around. Think of a rocket with thrust but no stabilization. Cool idea but very hard to make practical.</text></comment>
<story><title>New nuclear deflection simulations advance planetary defense against asteroids</title><url>https://www.llnl.gov/article/50716/new-nuclear-deflection-simulations-advance-planetary-defense-against-asteroid-threats</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>spenczar5</author><text>So, this research is extremely cool. The way nuclear deflection works is not how you think. You probably don’t blast the rock to bits. Instead, Burkey’s model uses a bomb tunes to produce a crazy amount of x-ray radiation which heats up one side of the asteroid. You heat it up so much that the rock liquifies, then bubbles, and outgasses - and forms a propulsive engine, right on the surface, shooting out gaseous ultra-hot rock.&lt;p&gt;Newton’s third law kicks in: as the asteroid ejects mass in one direction, the asteroid reacts by going the opposite way. So you have altered the orbital trajectory of the asteroid, averting disaster.&lt;p&gt;The whole approach is very sensitive to the detonation height, asteroid composition and color, rotational characteristics, etc. So Burkey’s group has really made a simulation framework for modeling the right thing to do for a given asteroid.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>noman-land</author><text>How do you prevent the asteroid from flying erratically like a balloon with the air rushing out?</text></comment>