For that, they would have had to ascend the ribbon with an average speed of 11 mph. They didn't quite reach that goal but it appears that we are finally making real progress on a concept first proposed in 1895. What's more, the ground laser that was used to charge the photovoltaic cells used half the power than their previous model with far better results. This year's contest has not concluded, and there is the possibility that another team could equal or surpass LaserMotive's results, but at the very least there is reason to believe that the idea of an elevator that reaches to space might not be so far fetched after all. [AP via PopSci]

It's pretty heady stuff, because instead of a single string extending into the heavens, there are two "floppy" ones that form an ellipse, harnessing the rotation of the earth as a means to turn the elevator to propel things upwards. West Virginia University rocket scientists Leonardo Golubović and Steven Knudsen proposed it, and they think it just might work. Says PhysOrg.com:

The unique double rotating motion of looped strings could provide a mechanism for objects to slide up the elevator cable into outer space. The space elevator could launch satellites and spacecraft with humans, and even be used to host space stations and research posts.

If you want to grasp the science behind all this stuff—which I haven't even attempted to explain—I recommend you have a look at the PhysOrg story. Me, I'll just sit here, contemplating what an additional 10,000 miles of altitude will do for my fear of heights. [PhysOrg.com via KurzweilAI.net; painting by Dean Ellis from this 1981 Omni Magazine article reprint about a pretty ambitious space elevator not unlike, but definitely not exactly like, the one proposed above.]

Motivated by a $4 million funding prize from NASA, the team at Cambridge University developed a light, flexible ribbon that is believed to be the world's strongest. Currently, the team is producing 1 gram of the material per day, enough to stretch to 18 miles in length. According to Alan Windle, professor of materials science at Cambridge, NASA wants 144,000 miles of the stuff—but he notes that it would take an industrial level of production to make that happen.

Still, this once preposterous idea is actually gaining some traction. The Japanese have already seriously considered making one out of carbon nanotubes and some believe that this new project could get the job done in as little as a decade. I'm not buying that—but I'm still keeping an open mind. [Times Online via io9]

You see, nanotubes separated by more than one wavelength (five micrometers) are invisible. And the one centimeter human-supporting rope mentioned above takes the five-micrometer principle into account. Imagine scaling such an idea to create a series of invisible ropes in architecture, a sort of flying buttress that you can't see.

But what's possibly even more amazing—that human-supporting rope weighs just 10 milligrams per kilometer. If the distance from the ground into space is 80km, that means that an 800 milligram rope could lift humans into space. 800 milligrams is less than the weight of three aspirin tablets.

Crazy, crazy stuff. [Springer via NewScientist]

[Space Elevator Blog]

There are startups and then there are startups. Web 2.0 is all fine and dandy and I love AJAX as much as the next person but let's face it, as amazing as Flickr, del.icio.us and MeasureMap are, they and the rest of the new web apps combined and taken to the tenth power aren't even half as sexy as the Space Elevator. The what? Business 2.0's Georgia Flight explains:

Earth is constantly spinning. So if you attach a counterweight to it with a cable, and put it far enough away—62,000 miles—the cable will be held taut by the force of the planet's rotation, just as if you spun around while holding a ball on a string. And if you've got a taut cable, you've got the makings of an elevator.

As strange as that sounds—push the "Up" button, climb in, and soar off into weightless bliss—don't be surprised if it happens. The space elevator is where the PC was in the 1960s: The theory is solid, the materials exist, and people in garages are starting to tinker with the next step. Two Seattle startups are competing to build the elevator. Both believe they can do it within 15 years at a cost of $10 billion. NASA and China's space agency are eager to help make it happen.

And no wonder: A working elevator would reduce the cost of launching anything into space by roughly 98 percent.

98 percent! Biggest discount EVER? So of course the US wants it, China wants it and so does Japan. If and when it does become reality, the country that gets a Space Elevator first will likely have a stranglehold on space commerce for a long time.

The 62,000-Mile Elevator Ride [Business 2.0]
The Space Elevator Reference Blog
Space Elevator [Wikipedia]
"How Space Elevators Will Work" [Howstuffworks]