Far Far Away, Physics are the same

What is the engineering behind the Death Star?

- ... And what about hyperspace travels?
- It is complicated, since many things need to be considered, like when Han Solo travels with the Millennium Falcon
- Who?
- Han Solo.
- That is someone from Star Wars, isn't it?

And that is how things are over before even starting. Because every time a person does not know SW, an Ewok cries in the woods, and nobody wants to tag along with people that makes Ewoks cry.

Star Wars fans are really fanatic. There's no shading, either you love it, or you did not see it.

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Something similar happens with physics fans, one day, they sign up for an acrobatics class and the suddenly lose the fear to spin in the air at outrageous speeds, since they understand that Angular Momentum and equilibrium. Now, I do not recommend this anecdote as one you should be telling at the bar. Neither as bait to attract a copulation partner, it does not work.

Now imagine that we put a bit of each one of these ingredients in a blender and get as a result something we may call geek essence, by drinking it, people is able to laugh out of The Big Bang Theory's Jokes.

Something like that is what the guys from the Department of Physics and Astronomy from the University of Leicester, England. The folks took leverage on the premiere of The Force Awakens (aka: Disney really knows how to gather money with shovels), so that his grade students learned how to publish their works, analyzing nothing else but: Star Wars' Physics.

In the article number one, they analyze how much energy does the Death Star need to destroy a planet (while the Galactic Senate debates over whether fund the project or not, but that is part of the Dark Side of the Sciences Force; this is: The Department of Economics). This question comes from a mythic scene in Star Wars: Episode IV, when Grand Moff Tarkin wipes off the galactic map the planet Alderaan, where Princess Leia was from (I love you, your weir hairstyle, your golden bikini and your incipient endogamy), to display the superb destructive power the first Death Star had.

As in any serious investigation, the guys start saying that they will overlap some things for their model, FYI: Earth's kind is "Earth", it does not have shields or any kind of protection mechanism (those two suppositions are based on data retrieved from the movie) and we assume that it is solid (for the sake of simplicity).

Considering that it is an spherical mass with uniform energy density, we get that the gravitational potential energy can be calculated as:

U = (3 x G x Mp²)/(5 x Rp)

Where Mp is the Mass from the planet, Rp the radius and G the universal gravitational constant.

The gravitational potential energy is what allows the planet to keep her beautiful figure, keeping the particles together. Them, if one could REKT it with an equal of higher energy but of an opposite sign potential, those particles could disperse, disintegrating the whole planet. YAY!!!

Taking the data available, the energy needed would be:

U= 2, 25 x 10 ³² J

According to some references, the Death Star's hypermatter reactor was able to generate energy equivalent to the energy produced by "young" stars that, just like the Sun, acquire their energy with nuclear fusion, "burning" hydrogen into helium. Generally speaking, that energy is more than enough for the attack to be successful. The Sun, for example, generates 3x10 ²⁶ J/sec. A BUNCH (I know you missed my magic word). This is, in less than 9 days (8.68) it generates enough energy to F*ck everything up. So, the Death Star has enough "juice" to wipe out around a planet of the size of the Earth per week. BUT, if we input the Radius and Mass data of a large planet like Jupiter into the equation, then the things get a little up hill for our beloved spherical can of soda.

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What I loved about this article, is that talking about the destructive physics Anakin's fetish had, left me thinking about "energy", and because of that I forgive the Force to not be a "Force", and that explosions transmit sound over the void of space.

What I cannot omit is that I was also Padawan some time ago, one that had no idea about stars and planets, and now I gaze upon the sky thanks to that saga.

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