A typical piston
engine works because one can control the pressure of the gases inside
the cylinders via an engine cycle that includes igniting gasoline
vapors. In order to use the Casimir force for technological purposes,
one must similarly be able to control the intensity of such force.
A device invented by Dr. Pinto at InterStellar Technologies Corporation
achieves this goal and it allows one to design engine cycles that
make use of the Casimir force. Such device is referred to as the TRANSVACER™ (TRANSducer of VACuum enERgy) device and it is based upon proprietary Casimir force control technologies developed as part of the R&D program at InterStellar Technologies. The TRANSVACER™ device represents a winning engineering strategy because it offers several remarkable advantages over naively attempting to implement traditional technologies on the
micro- and nanotechnology scales.
To
use a force in technology, one must be able to control it
In order to employ a specific force to carry out a technological task,
it must be possible to manipulate such force, possibly in both space
and time. For instance, one can obtain the desired amount of thrust
from the wind to push a sailboat towards a particular direction by
appropriately orienting the sail to the apparent direction of the
wind, by increasing or decreasing the area of the sail exposed to
the pressure of the wind, and by navigating along an appropriate route
with respect to the wind. Evidently, if the pressure of the wind on
the sail could in no way be manipulated in both intensity and direction,
carrying out a round trip under steady winds by sailboat would be
quite impracticable.
If one develops
the concept of force control to a higher degree of sophistication,
it is possible to show how to transform, for instance, the chemical
energy stored in gasoline into mechanical energy of motion of an
automobile by appropriately increasing and decreasing the pressure
and the volume of gas in the cylinders through a cyclic process.
Such process is referred to as an engine cycle. Once the engine
shaft is turning, one can further determine the rotational speed
of the wheels and the torque they apply to the contact point on
the road by acting on the gears. Finally, the direction of motion
of the car is determined, for instance, by aligning the front wheels
as desired.
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The
TRANSVACER™ device as a quantum vacuum engine
The starting point of R&D activities at InterStellar Technologies
Corporation was the discovery by Dr. Pinto of an engine cycle that
allows dispersion forces to be used to transform, for instance,
electromagnetic radiation or heat into mechanical or electrical
energy. Dr. Pinto named Casimir force-based devices that make use of such engine cycles Transvacer™ (TRANSducers of VACuum enERgy) devices.
The Transvacer™ device represented the theoretical solution to the very well known problem that, although one could easily conceive to transform
zero-point-energy into, for instance, mechanical or electrical energy,
no Casimir force-based engine cycle could be devised if one assumed
a constant Casimir force.
Dr. Pinto's
work not only proved that an engine cycle can be built by making
use of Casimir forces, but his extremely detailed calculations,
which made use of the most up-to-date spectral data available at
the time, also yielded important details on the basic and applied
physics of this process. One of the most stimulating results of
this initial effort was the proof that one can, in principle, build
an engine that is not dissimilar from any other engine, but in which
the zero-point-energy field is manipulated by means of radiation
or heat instead of the gas pressure in the typical cylinders being
altered by exploding gasoline.
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Strengths
of the TRANSVACER™ device over traditional technologies
This is extremely
important from the standpoint of technological applications of the
Casimir force, since attempts to replicate typical chemical and
electrical engines at the micro- and nano-technology scales have
faced substantial difficulties in recent years. Although the creativity
of microelectromechanical system engineers has allowed for great
strides in the design of microengines, one cannot help concluding
that the concepts behind macroscopic machines probably cannot be
applied to arbitrarily small scales.
Although it is certainly possible to attempt to manufacture microscopic
electric motors, nature is clearly telling us that, as size decreases,
simply attempting to fabricate smaller and smaller implementations
of what works in our everyday life in the end will be neither possible
nor logical and an entirely new concept is needed. The Transvacer™ device is such revolutionary concept -- one that InterStellar Technologies Corporation is pursuing as the winning technological answer to the
growing demand for a truly efficient and highly versatile energy
conversion and actuation concept for the world of micromachines.
Among the winning advantages of the Transvacer™ device approach, one can mention the
following examples: (1) Transvacer™-device-based engines do not need
electrical power to output mechanical energy - they can be, for
instance, entirely light-driven; (2) since no electrical current is involved, the efficiencies of Transvacer™ devices are expected to be much higher than their typical electrical or chemical counterparts;
(3) since the processes that are expected to be exploited to achieve Casimir force manipulation take place within the structure of the Transvacer™ device itself, reaction speeds are expected to be much
higher than those in conventional microstructures.
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Areas
of emphasis of Theoretical R&D at InterStellar Technologies
Theoretical
Casimir force research at InterStellar Technologies Corporation
is directed at supporting the goal to manipulate and control such
force for a variety of technological applications and with a variety
of means. Areas of emphasis are:
1. Casimir
force modulation;
2. Repulsive Casimir force;
3. Lateral Casimir force;
4. Casimir force amplification
5. Energy issues in relation to the quantum vacuum.
The theoretical
know-how acquired in our company is then exploited to model devices
of potential commercial use in our four areas of main application
focus: aerospace, microactuation, telecommunications, and medicine.
In addition
to the more ordinary theoretical research in this field, some resources
are also allocated to the more speculative questions of possible
net energy transfer from the zero-point-energy field because of
their immense potential to contribute to the energy problem, if
confirmed. Although this research is certainly less likely to yield
commercial devices in the short term, one by-product of its pursuit
is the greatly increased overall practical understanding of the real performance of the Transvacer™ device, as also demonstrated by Dr. Pinto's published research.
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