MIT student wins Hyperloop design contest

Over the weekend, Elon Musk's dream of creating a super-fast transit system has come a step closer to reality.

On Saturday, January 30, students from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology won the first stage of the SpaceX Super Hyperloop design competition at Texas A & M University's College Station. .

The special design of the MIT HyperLop train containing the Hyperloop students defeated more than 100 other teams. They are now working on building a small prototype for summer testing at SpaceX headquarters in California.

Hyperloop model of MIT student group.

"MIT has contributed to a lot of technological breakthroughs in the last century , " said team captain Philippe Kirschen, aviation master and astronaut. "And now we are contributing to the future of transportation."

Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX and Tesla Motors, has announced the idea of his Hyperloop ship in a document in 2013. The system will use a special pipe, with the passenger inside moving inside. in the pipeline in almost vacuum condition. Thanks to this, the ship can travel between cities up to 1,500 km apart at super-fast speeds. According to Musk, the ship can run at speeds up to 1,100km / h.

Musk thought to use an air cushion to help the ship as well as the pipeline to fly. However, the MIT team decided to use a magnet on a conductive plate. The MIT team shared that the aluminum test track that SpaceX built near the headquarters would act as a conduit.

"The biggest advantage of our system is that it's completely passive, so the pipeline is very scalable," says Kirschen.