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Old 08-08-2011, 07:54 AM
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CraigS
Unpredictable

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Join Date: Jul 2010
Location: Australia
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Quote:
Though Earth has a relatively small antiproton supply in terms of very high delta-v missions, the supply is likely large enough to enable a bootstrap mission where a spacecraft first stops in Earth orbit for a partial ‘fuel up’ and then travels to Saturn to extract most of the fuel for an interstellar precursor mission.

Earth has a minimal (0.25 - 15 ng) trapped supply of antiprotons. This is replenished over a period of several years. The low level is due to inefficiencies in backscattering albedo antineutrons from the atmosphere. Significant fluxes of positrons may exist, though a quasi-static supply < 1 μg is most likely.

Saturn has the largest trapped antiproton supply in the Solar System (estimated at ~400 μg) due to high antineutron production from GCR interactions with its ring system. The flux of transient antiprotons produced in the ring system is also predicted to be significant.
Source: Extraction of Antiparticles Concentrated in Planetary Magnetic Fields, (April 2006). James Bickford Principal Investigator, NIAC

Quote:
Over a period of 850 days, between July 2006 and December 2008, sensors onboard PAMELA detected 28 antiprotons
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