Lucky wrote:Lucky wrote:
Now on to the Superlasers on the Death Stars
ANH novelization, chapter 11 wrote: "Theoretically, no weapon could penetrate the exceptionally dense stone of the ancient temple, but Luke had seen the shattered remains of Alderaan and knew that for those in the incredible battle station the entire moon would present simply another abstract problem in mass-energy conversion"
ANH novelization, chapter 8) wrote: "It would take a microbreakdown of a portion of this map to reveal a slight reduction in spatial mass, caused by the disappearance of Alderaan."
NPR Radio Drama of ANH wrote: VADER: Our Prime Weapon is even more powerful than we'd calculated, Lord Tarkin.
TARKIN: Indeed.
The above quotes taken with movie visuals indicate that the Superlasers on the Death Stars turn matter to energy.
MauriceWindows wrote:
Or that it's powered by fusion, which is the only way that matter can be converted to energy (i.e. without combining it with anti-matter): by converting lighter elements to heavier ones, incurring a lower net mass in the products than the reagents.
Matter-Energy is an exothermic reaction, matter is the lowest energy-state, and therefore no such "chain reaction" can happen, since energy can't be created.
Likewise, Wong says that Alderaan explodes at .05C, yielding an energy-figure of 1E+38 J.
The problem here is twofold:
First, that's 10,000 times the amount of power needed to vaporize the planet. However, we see the "Alderaan Graveyard" of meteors, when the Falcon enters the Alderaan system; therefore the planet's mass is still orbiting the Alderaan sun.
This indicates a power-figure of no greater than E+29J , i.e. the maximum energy needed for the planet's mass to reach escape-velocity without breaking stellar-orbit. This would yield a max. velocity of 11kps-- not 15,000kps, as Wong claims happened (i.e. .05C).
This requires only an energy-shift of no more than 11J/g.
This weaves a definite paradox between the observed events.
My answer:
The Death Star was essentially a giant hyperdrive-system, both for its own propulsion as well as to destroy planets.
Here, the planet exploded from its own ambient heat, by its mass being converted to tachyon ala hyperdrive. By shortening the distance to outer space by a factor of over 1363:1, this increased the planet's rate of thermal radiation into outer space by a factor of over 18 million.
Thus, the planet exploded by a simple cooling of its entire mass a few degrees C, which easily represents a specific-heat of 11J/g.
Thus, the mysterious "tachyonic hyperdrive" technology which shortened distances by millions of times, here shrunk the planet's distances by merely a thousand or so.
This would also explain why it couldn't destroy Yavin, i.e. the tachyonic field wasn't big enough. If the Superlaser were a DET or chain-reaction beam, then it could easily make the gas-giant go nova via fusion-reaction. But here, it could only distribute the planet's heat within itself, which was nowhere near as discrepant.
This is the only answer which maintains consistency with both canon and physics.
You're using the extended universe which is not aloud in this thread.
.
You'll have to be more specific than that. I'm not using any EU-canon, simply the on-screen evidence by which distances become compressed in hyperspace in a one-step shift.
1) The G-Canon quotes say the Superlaser turns matter to energy through a chain reaction.
No, that's
your interpretation of what they say. Be careful to remember the difference.
Mass-energy conversion could mean the fusion-reaction that powers the superlaser, nothing more.
in physics. the First Rule of Thermodynamics applies: i.e. energy can neither be created nor destroyed, therefore it has to go somewhere and be accounted for.
Here in this case we also run into the Second Law of Thermodyamics: i.e. the law of entropy, whereby heat always flows to a cooler surface, from higher energy to lower energy.
Normally with a planet, heat radiates into space at a slow rate due to the distances involved. But if this distance were shortened by 1363:1, then this rate would increase by a factor of over 18 million (i.e. 1361 ^2, due to the inverse-square law of radiation), and the entropy-factor would increase accordingly.
Thus out-radiation of the planet's ambient thermal energy, would exceed the binding-energy of the planet itself, of 11j/g.
Thus essentially, the planet's thermal-kinetic energy reverts back to potential energy, and the mass becomes distributed at a distance from the planetary core as the Alderaan Graveyard.
This exactly the reverse of how the planet got hot in the first place when it first formed via asteroids slamming together due to gravity-- i.e. potential energy converted to kinetic.
Basically this just reverses the process.
I look at it like the planet being a ship, and the Death Star being a hyperdrive-motivator that shifts it into hyperspace. (However it doesn't accelerate the planet like a hyperdrive does, so it doesn't need to worry about energy for that).
Let's look at the size-ratio's between a hyperdrive motivator, and the mass of a starship. In TPM, Watto's hyperdrive-motivator is a fwe kg's at most, while Padme's ship is at least a few thousand kg's.
So let's say that the ratio of a hyperdrive-motivator to a ship's mass, is about 1000:1.
Now let's also look at the effect it has on the ship, allowing it to travel at least a million times faster than in realspace. So let's just say, for the sake of argument, that it's 1 million:1, in order to reach 20,000 C by using fusion-power as an energy-source.
Now let's look at the mass of the Death Star.
Darkstar's page on volumetrics says that the Death Star is about 600 trillion tons, i.e. 6e+17kg.
So since it's only changing the planet's dimensions by a factor of about 1000:1 (vs. 1million:1 for a starship), then the reactor-mass ratio changes to 1 million:1, or 6 E+23.
Finally, since since it's a weapon, not an engine, then it can expand these specs a bit, while still having a wide safety-margin the DS itself.
So it's quite reasonable, given the information we see in the films, for the DS reactor to destroy a planet by simple entropy of its own ambient heat into the relatively cold space around it, via hyper-shifting its space to shorten those distances.