Space and Physics
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China has decided to take hypergravity to a whole new level – testing both materials and fundamental physics in a regime we have not been able to explore in the lab. After breaking the record for most powerful centrifuge in September last year, Zhejiang University has now got an even better version.
The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or subscribe to access the full content.The record-holder is called CHIEF1300 and has a capacity of 1,300 g·tonne, which means it can make 1,000 kilograms of material experience 1,300 gs of acceleration. The new one is the CHIEF 1900, with an increased capacity of 1,900 g·tonne. This will allow even more detailed studies into hypergravity, with applications for civil engineering, especially when it comes to quake-protection and the safety of huge construction projects.
What is hypergravity?
On the surface of the Earth, you are experiencing an acceleration of 9.8 meters per second squared. Due to the shape, motion, and irregular density of our planet, the acceleration changes a little from place to place. Not enough for us to feel it, but it might affect precision measurements (maybe even Olympic records, as mentioned in an XKCD comic).
The standard value is known as 1g and it is perfectly normal to occasionally experience more. An accelerating vehicle or a lift could place a bit more than 1g on you. Roller coasters can provide several gs once you are in it.
Hypergravity aims at simulating a much higher gravitational pull by providing even greater accelerations. Objects tested under hypergravity experience accelerations that are not present on Earth in natural conditions.
How do you simulate hypergravity?
One of the tenets of Einstein’s theory of General Relativity is that a gravitational acceleration and an inertial acceleration are indistinguishable. So, something being accelerated is like something experiencing a strong gravitational pull. One might think that rockets are a great way to do that, but our standard way to get into space usually has G-forces of 3 or 4 gs. There are more extreme rollercoasters than that.
A great and easier way to simulate gravity is by using a centrifuge system. An object in a rotating system will experience an acceleration that can be made to be much greater than standard gravity. Centrifuges are used in labs with many applications but these massive ones aim to push gravity to our achievable extreme.
What’s the goal of a hypergravity centrifuge?
You won’t be getting extreme gravity like near a black hole, but machines like CHIEF1900 allow for both fundamental physics testing as well as testing materials. Do you want to know how a dam would fare under real conditions? You build a model to scale and slap it into the centrifuge. How about a particular building material experiencing an earthquake? The centrifuge is right there. Actually, stick a bunch of different rocks in to see what might happen to them in the same quake.
Hypergravity can also be used in exploring the peculiar effects of gravity on things like clocks. For example, the higher the gravity, the slower a clock ticks, so having an extremely high-gravity environment to test the most precise clocks is useful. Although it might be more pressing for many to know if a megadam is safe or if new building materials or designs can withstand extreme forces.
If you want to know if hypergravity is survivable by humans, the answer is a resounding no. Humans might survive extremely brief accelerations or decelerations of several gs, maybe even a few dozen gs. CHIEF1900 would deliver to the average human something like 27,000 gs. That would prove to be quite fatal.
