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posted by martyb on Wednesday December 20 2017, @11:27AM   Printer-friendly
from the say-hi-to-Vir-Cotto-for-me dept.

NASA thinks that the technologies needed to launch an interstellar probe to Alpha Centauri at a speed of up to 0.1c could be ready by 2069:

In 2069, if all goes according to plan, NASA could launch a spacecraft bound to escape our solar system and visit our next-door neighbors in space, the three-star Alpha Centauri system, according to a mission concept presented last week at the annual conference of the American Geophysical Union and reported by New Scientist. The mission, which is pegged to the 100th anniversary of the moon landing, would also involve traveling at one-tenth the speed of light.

Last year, Representative John Culberson called for NASA to launch a 2069 mission to Alpha Centauri, but it was never included in any bill.

Meanwhile, researchers have analyzed spectrographic data for the Alpha Centauri system and found that small, rocky exoplanets are almost certainly undiscovered due to current detection limits:

The researchers set up a grid system for the Alpha Centauri system and asked, based on the spectrographic analysis, "If there was a small, rocky planet in the habitable zone, would we have been able to detect it?" Often, the answer came back: "No."

Zhao, the study's first author, determined that for Alpha Centauri A, there might still be orbiting planets that are smaller than 50 Earth masses. For Alpha Centauri B there might be orbiting planets than are smaller than 8 Earth masses; for Proxima Centauri, there might be orbiting planets that are less than one-half of Earth's mass.

In addition, the study eliminated the possibility of a number of larger planets. Zhao said this takes away the possibility of Jupiter-sized planets causing asteroids that might hit or change the orbits of smaller, Earth-like planets.

(For comparison, Saturn is ~95 Earth masses, Neptune is ~17, Uranus is ~14.5, and Mars is ~0.1.)

Also at BGR and Newsweek.

Planet Detectability in the Alpha Centauri System (DOI: 10.3847/1538-3881/aa9bea) (DX)


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  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday December 20 2017, @11:58AM (14 children)

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday December 20 2017, @11:58AM (#612254) Journal

    About 40 years travel time (assuming the vehicle achieves .1c quickly, and can brake quickly, which is unlikely, so add a couple years for accel and decel) then we wait about 4 years for any radio transmissions to come back to us. That isn't quickly enough to make me happy, but at least people are thinking in the right direction. Expect some kind of results around 2110 to 2115, if everything goes right. There are babies being born today who might live long enough to see headlines about newly discovered planets in the Centauri systems.

    We could get some inconclusive results sooner than that, presuming that sensing equipment is focused on the system during travel. But, about the time the sensors start getting a good picture, it will be time to turn and burn, meaning, the sensors will be pointed at earth, rather than Centauri. And, no, I don't think that swiveling the sensors will give a good picture during deceleration. There's going to be a fire right there, in the way. I guess it will be a good time to see what our own system looks like from interstellar space.

    Of course, we can also survey portions of the galaxy outside of the line-of-sight travel path. Parallax is a beautiful thing - having sensors outside of the solar system is likely to tell us interesting things about other systems, as well. Maybe we have a lot of distances figured wrong, because our measuremaent base is just to damned small for accuracy?

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  • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 20 2017, @12:03PM (4 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 20 2017, @12:03PM (#612259)

    That isn't quickly enough to make me happy

    Oh, get real! Nothing, absolutely nothing in this world is made to make you happy.

    • (Score: 3, Funny) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday December 20 2017, @12:27PM (2 children)

      by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday December 20 2017, @12:27PM (#612263) Journal

      Now and then, something makes me smile, if not really happy. https://pics.me.me/cantafford-to-feed-and-house-please-spay-or-neuter-your-14920440.png [pics.me.me]

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 20 2017, @12:44PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 20 2017, @12:44PM (#612266)

        All good until you realize that this is only incidental.

        By the example you chose as an feeble attempt of a rebuttal, you implicitly admit that even what you are making (and over which you should have a modicum of control) is not making you happy.

        Merry Christmas, old sod, may your next year plastics come better that this year's - not like you'll benefit from it, but at least you can chalk one as remarkable enough to justify your life on this Earth.

      • (Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Wednesday December 20 2017, @05:58PM

        by bzipitidoo (4388) on Wednesday December 20 2017, @05:58PM (#612411) Journal

        Conservatives hate family planning, especially abortion. Now the truth comes out. They like family planning just fine when applied to liberals only!

        Anyway, we need longer lifespans. If all goes well with that plan, it'll be 2113 before any data comes back. Even today's 9 year olds probably won't be around in 2113.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 20 2017, @07:06PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 20 2017, @07:06PM (#612454)

      Make it a congressional fact-finding trip and I'll be happy.

  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by zocalo on Wednesday December 20 2017, @01:28PM (1 child)

    by zocalo (302) on Wednesday December 20 2017, @01:28PM (#612280)

    There are babies being born today who might live long enough to see headlines about newly discovered planets in the Centauri systems.

    Assuming there are any such planets, then there are probably plenty of full-grown adults around today that will live long enough to hear about them, maybe even called Runaway1956; just because Kepler and other planet hunting projects haven't found them yet, doesn't mean they won't have by the time this probe gets there (assuming it even gets sent). Whatever instrument package a probe like this carries probably needs to be fairly heavily biased towards things that can only be done with a probe in-situ or there's a risk that it'll all be one big "Meh!" when it eventually arrives because of advances in observations we can do from right here in the Sol system while it was in transit. For comparison, NASA launched the Voyager probes fourty years ago this year so it'd be as if the data and (by modern standards) incredibly low-res images from that mission wasn't even due to start trickling in for a few more years (Jupiter in 2019, Saturn in 2020/21, Uranus in 2025, and Neptune in 2029) compared to what we can achieve with today's ground and LEO based observatories.

    --
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    • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday December 20 2017, @03:50PM

      by JoeMerchant (3937) on Wednesday December 20 2017, @03:50PM (#612335)

      You can't give the natives smallpox using a telescope. Many things require a physical presence, and even if the first mission doesn't do all the things, it will be establishing that physical presence capability.

      --
      🌻🌻 [google.com]
  • (Score: 3, Funny) by Bot on Wednesday December 20 2017, @02:08PM (1 child)

    by Bot (3902) on Wednesday December 20 2017, @02:08PM (#612290) Journal

    Also many unknown other factors into play.
    For example, a possible scenario is the probe returning ahead of time at approx. 5c with "KEEP YOUR DAMN JUNK ON YOUR OWN SIDE, CARBONBAGS" hastily engraved over it.

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    • (Score: 2) by Bot on Wednesday December 20 2017, @02:35PM

      by Bot (3902) on Wednesday December 20 2017, @02:35PM (#612297) Journal

      Not to mention the dangerous wooshing by of the probe in a crazy return path at 40c, and 9 year after that, a radio announcement coming from outer space:

      "ZERO FIFTEEN, HAHAHA"

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      Account abandoned.
  • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday December 20 2017, @03:39PM (4 children)

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Wednesday December 20 2017, @03:39PM (#612328)

    Too lazy to read the article, but assuming that 0.1c is going to require something other than fire for propulsion. Whatever is providing the propulsion would likely distort long range sensing apparatus, but nothing says that it has to "burn" 100% of the time - if there's a 5 year decel period, they might burn for a month, then stop for a few hours to take a picture and transmit it, then resume the burn.

    Just transmitting a picture from that distance is going to be an interesting challenge. Almost as challenging as retaining socio-political stability sufficient to fund the Earth-side support (data reception and analysis) station that long / far in the future.

    --
    🌻🌻 [google.com]
    • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday December 20 2017, @04:38PM (3 children)

      by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday December 20 2017, @04:38PM (#612352) Journal

      At a guess, the fastest way to do it, would be to use a YUGE conventional rocket array at this end, and reach max velocity pretty quickly. Deceleration would take vastly more time, using solar sails and something like an ion engine. But, that's just a guess. I haven't read the article either. ;^)

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 20 2017, @07:00PM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 20 2017, @07:00PM (#612449)

        But, that's just a guess. I haven't read the article either. ;^)

        Yes, we know. This much is obvious. When the topic is interstellar rocket science, I always turn to Runaway!

        • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday December 21 2017, @12:14AM

          by JoeMerchant (3937) on Thursday December 21 2017, @12:14AM (#612636)

          Sadly, most articles like this are short on the underlying science, engineering and state of development of the various promising technologies.

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          🌻🌻 [google.com]
      • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday December 20 2017, @11:55PM

        by JoeMerchant (3937) on Wednesday December 20 2017, @11:55PM (#612626)

        I think conventional YUGE rockets hit an asymptote of diminishing returns long before they get to 0.1C. Voyager is only doing Mach 50, and a lot of that is due to gravity assist. Chemical energy release makes hot gas, so there are mach concerns even if you can increase the density and decrease your mach number, pretty quickly we're going to run out of alloys that can contain such a pressures.

        The solar sail decel is a nice thought, but somehow I doubt it would be enough - very little power coming from the sun until the last few days of approach at 0.1C.

        --
        🌻🌻 [google.com]