We're edging closer to interstellar reality. 🤔 engineering
Interstellar exploration might not be lightyears away, at least not in the figurative sense. That's because international research project Breakthrough Starshot just provided an update on its plans to send a probe to Alpha Centauri, our closest neighboring star system.
As a point of reference, our fastest and most reliable technology today for long-range space travel is the ion thruster, which is powering, with the ion thruster, it would take 18,000 years, or approximately 2,700 human generations, to get to Alpha Centauri. that will be powered by a powerful laser array from Earth. That laser array will concentrate millions of beams on the sail throughout its interstellar journey, allowing it to reach incredible speeds."To cover the vast distances between Alpha Centauri and our own solar system, we must think outside the box and forge a new way for interstellar space travel," Dr. Bandutunga, from the Applied Metrology Laboratories at the ANU Centre for Gravitational Astrophysics, explains.