Astronomers Just Found Cosmic 'Superhighways' For Fast Travel Through The Solar System

Searched and didn't see this posted here so I thought i'd share.

I have to admit, I don't entirely understand all of it, but astronomers have found 'channels' between the planets in the solar system where particles travel significantly faster than other areas. In a two examples it lowered the time of transit to a few decades from centuries.

The scientists believe this discovery could help us travel more quickly through the solar system and understand better how asteroids and comets move through the solar system.

If anyone has a more layperson way of describing what these things actually are that'd be great. From what i can figure out, it's something to do with gravity and the planetary orbits, bur i'm honestly not sure.

www.sciencealert.com...

Invisible structures generated by gravitational interactions in the Solar System have created a "space superhighway" network, astronomers have discovered.

These channels enable the fast travel of objects through space, and could be harnessed for our own space exploration purposes, as well as the study of comets and asteroids.

By applying analyses to both observational and simulation data, a team of researchers led by Nataša Todorović of Belgrade Astronomical Observatory in Serbia observed that these superhighways consist of a series of connected arches inside these invisible structures, called space manifolds - and each planet generates its own manifolds, together creating what the researchers have called "a true celestial autobahn".

This network can transport objects from Jupiter to Neptune in a matter of decades, rather than the much longer timescales, on the order of hundreds of thousands to millions of years, normally found in the Solar System.

Here," the researchers wrote in their paper, "we use the FLI to detect the presence and global structure of space manifolds, and capture instabilities that act on orbital time scales; that is, we use this sensitive and well-established numerical tool to more generally define regions of fast transport within the Solar System."

They collected numerical data on millions of orbits in the Solar System, and computed how these orbits fit with known manifolds, modelling the perturbations generated by seven major planets, from Venus to Neptune

And they found that the most prominent arches, at increasing heliocentric distances, were linked with Jupiter; and most strongly with its Lagrange point manifolds. All Jovian close encounters, modelled using test particles, visited the vicinity of Jupiter's first and second Lagrange points.

A few dozen or so particles were then flung into the planet on a collision course; but a vast number more, around 2,000, became uncoupled from their orbits around the Sun to enter hyperbolic escape orbits. On average, these particles reached Uranus and Neptune 38 and 46 years later, respectively, with the fastest reaching Neptune in under a decade.

The majority - around 70 percent - reached a distance of 100 astronomical units (Pluto's average orbital distance is 39.5 astronomical units) in less than a century.

Jupiter's huge influence is not a huge surprise. Jupiter is, apart from the Sun, the most massive object in the Solar System. But the same structures would be generated by all the planets, on timescales commensurate with their orbital periods, the researchers found.

This new understanding could help us better understand how comets and asteroids move around the inner Solar System, and their potential threat to Earth. And, of course, there's the aforementioned benefit to future Solar System exploration missions.

If I'm not mistaken, something similar to following behind a semi on the highway to improve mileage?

I haven't fully looked through this, but that's my skimming cursory thought.

Not gonna lie but this is a killer discovery. It's the equivalent of the universe having currents

Excuse me while I rip on my bong and think about the possibilities of gravitational superhighways

Awesome, not going to lie but I pictured this while reading your post.

Small objects are influenced by much larger objects and their associated gravity fields. I thought they used this knowledge to accelerate the Voyager probes.

So they're like jetstreams, but objects are pushed along due to gravity.

Isn't this kind of a DUH moment?

Didn't we already know about this with "slingshot"?

This is an amazing discovery! Exciting stuff. Let's just hope a Vogon ship doesn't show up to clear Earth for a new super space highway. On second thought...

Excuse my naivete on the subject the OP said solar system as in our solar system, if so that fascinating as hell. How would one navigate it? and what if an asteroid got on one of these galactic superhighways?

Life in the Fast Lane

The existence of gravitational "manifolds" has been known for quite a while.
www.dept.aoe.vt.edu...

Think of it like a skateboard park. One with half-pipes that are always moving. It's not a free ride, but it does make the ride a lot easier. It's only "faster" if you're talking about using the same about of fuel. Using more fuel would be faster.

Thanks to AI, they found more of them. Gravity is complicated when there are a lot of moving bodies involved. That's really the fascinating part of it, not so much that they are there. That's old news.

a reply to: dug88

They found the Hitchhiker's Guide!

Always figured it would look something like, that since our galaxy is an humongous debris field.

a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn

Sounds like the Borg transwarp conduits in Star Trek Voyager - except a lot slower

originally posted by: notquiteright
This is an amazing discovery! Exciting stuff. Let's just hope a Vogon ship doesn't show up to clear Earth for a new super space highway. On second thought...

Sir, the plans have been on display for three months, in the basement.

Sounds to me like it's just making use of gravitational slingshot effect. Same thing we used for the Voyager probes.

a reply to: dug88

I didn’t even know there was an un-super highway, much less a super highway.

so there must be a super highway police stopping anyone going beyond the speed of light

woooooooooooooooooooooooo PULL OVER you are in violation of the laws of reality

Forget about using this for human space exploration. We aren't allowed to go infecting other places. Not kidding.

Is this genuine? Natasa Todorovic is a radiation physicist. Orbital mechanics is not her speciality.

The article is poorly written and quite confusing; in fact, it’s impossible to be sure what the author is talking about.

a reply to: Astyanax

Someone using sensationalism for attention, say it isn’t so. Next it will be aliens.

a reply to: beyondknowledge
They did, it’s called the slingshot method.