Ars Technica has a writer named Jennifer Ouellette.
Physicists say an engine like the one popularized in the 1960s is technically feasible, but it would take a more advanced civilization to build it.
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Ramjet propulsion has been around for a long time. This is a concept from NASA of a hypersonic vehicle.
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The starship crew in Anderson's novel attempt to colonize a new planet by traveling to the starBeta Virginis. Robert W. Bussard had proposed a "Bussard ramjet" as a means of propulsion a decade earlier. Physicists have reexamined this unusual mechanism for travel through space in a new paper, and they have found the ramjet wanting. The authors concluded that the engineering challenges are currently insurmountable, and that it is feasible from a pure physics standpoint.
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