Tethers tortured in $2 million contest

[n2doc]

Alan Boyle writes: Three teams brought lengths of string to the Strong Tether Challenge today in hopes of winning as much as $2 million of NASA's money. But they all went away empty-handed ... except for the shreds of carbon nanotubes and glass fiber they had to pick up off the floor.

This year's challenge, organized by the California-based Spaceward Foundation, was conducted in conjunction with the 2010 Space Elevator Conference on the Microsoft campus in Redmond, Wash. (Microsoft and NBC Universal are partners in the msnbc.com joint venture.) The aim of the contest is to promote the development of lightweight materials that can outperform the strongest fibers available today.

Eventually, such materials could be used in the construction of space elevators, "railways" that reach tens of thousands of miles into the sky. But there are more immediate applications for ultra-strong, ultra-light materials: to make stronger ropes, better bulletproof vests and body armor, lighter and hence more fuel-efficient cars and airplanes, and hardier spacecraft.

NASA has been putting up the prize money for the Strong Tether Challenge since 2005. Five other NASA-backed Centennial Challenges - for prototype lunar landers, moondirt-digging robots, astronaut gloves, innovations in aviation and beam-power systems - have all produced winners. But no one in the tether contest has won a dime yet.

http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2010/08/13/4883934-tethers-tortured-in-2-million-contest

"If any one of these tethers beats this tether, we can pack up and go home, because we're starting to build a space elevator," Shelef said.