(April 6, 2011 at 1:56 pm)Chuck Wrote: Maybe it can work with macroscopic objects via exceptionally powerful source of low frequency radio waves
The power required really would be exceptional!
Take a metre cube object, weighing 1kg, and assume 1% scattering (this is quite optimistic). To give it a macroscopic acceleration, say 0.1 m/s^2, you'd need an RF generator putting out about 10^9 Watts!
For comparison, communication radio stations put out about 10^4 Watts.
And that's not even mentioning the difficulties associated with getting the necessary beam profile; getting a decent short wavelength pseudo-Bessel beam (for optical tweezers and the like) is difficult enough, I wouldn't want to think about doing it with radio waves!
But by the time we can build the Death Star, I'm sure this won't be a problem
Galileo was a man of science oppressed by the irrational and superstitious. Today, he is used by the irrational and superstitious who claim they are being oppressed by science - Mark Crislip
