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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.)
Planet Detectability in the Alpha Centauri System (DOI: 10.3847/1538-3881/aa9bea) (DX)
(Score: 1) by ElizabethGreene on Thursday December 21 2017, @11:25PM (2 children)
I've read that we've made dramatic improvements to our ability to live in Microgravity, but I don't see the detail behind it. Is the force resistant treadmill on the ISS dramatically better than the one they had on SpaceLab? Is there something else?
The work on closed ecosystems has been fascinating, yes. I don't see the need to live in a closed system on the Moon or Mars though. There is literally an entire planet (or moon) of resources there. Here on Earth we have large crews that live for six months at a time without resupply in an enclosed open loop environment. e.g. Nuclear submarines. What, besides political will and heavy lift capacity, was the hold-up in implementing something like that on the Moon?
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday December 22 2017, @01:20AM
I agree - a large part of the appeal of colonizing a planet or asteroid, rather than building a free-floating habitat, is the abundance of raw materials.
Nevertheless, collecting and processing most of those materials is likely to be a time- and energy-intensive process, such that recycling them as much as possible is liable to be extremely cost-effective. I.e. you try not to let things flow "out", but bring new materials "in" as quickly as you have the ability and demand for. Or to express it differently differently - your hypothetical steady-state situation is as close to closed as you can make it, but the reality is that you're constantly growing and adapting.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday December 22 2017, @02:52AM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effect_of_spaceflight_on_the_human_body [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_medicine [wikipedia.org]
A lot of what we have learned on the ISS has been bad news for human health in microgravity. Hopefully, long-term lunar gravity will be less of a challenge.
We should aim to make these habitats waste-free and self-sustainable from the start, or at least as much as scientifically possible. Meaning the goal is no periodic resupply from Earth. They don't have to be closed ecosystems per se, but the things that we bring are resources that aren't likely to be reproduced so easily (3D-printing can only do so much). All the plastic should be biodegradable where possible, maybe made from the plants grown there and recycled by composting. There will be a desire to engage in industrial activity to produce useful products for the colonists. Miniaturization and other advances could help in this area. For example, miniature "chemputers" as well as genetically engineered microbes could produce a wide variety of drugs without the wasteful processes [theguardian.com] seen on Earth. You don't get the luxury of dumping waste and water outside, or venting gases into the atmosphere, since you need to recapture them all.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]