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posted by cmn32480 on Wednesday April 13 2016, @02:48AM   Printer-friendly
from the that's-a-tiny-spaceship dept.

The BBC and the Guardian both carry stories about an unmanned interstellar spacecraft designed to reach the Alpha Centauri system "within a generation" (30 or so years).

The spacecraft would be miniaturised to the size of an average silicon chip, and be propelled by a solar sail which would receive a boost from a powerful laser on the Earth.

Milner's Breakthrough Foundation is running a project, backed by Hawking, to research the technologies needed for such a mission, which they think will soon be feasible.

takyon: The campaign is called Breakthrough Starshot. Breakthrough Initiatives also announced the release of initial observational datasets from the Breakthrough Listen 10-year SETI effort.


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @09:57AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @09:57AM (#331077)

    If it's money to burn.... put a telescope on the far side of the moon, build infrastructure on the moon to connect it to our side and have people stationed there.

    Advantages are that you have a telescope without earth's noise and a good reason to start colonizing the moon. It also opens up the motivation for people again to look at and dream about the future.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @01:56PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @01:56PM (#331148)

    What noise? This isn't RF we're talking about.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 15 2016, @01:38AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 15 2016, @01:38AM (#331982)

      Radio astronomy is a thing.