Space exploration - Destination the Alpha Centauri star system

Never mind Mars aim for the stars
Astronaut Buzz Aldrin has urged us to set our sights on the Red Planet. But a Nasa expert says our future depends on striving to go even further

Neil Armstrong wants us to go back to the Moon. Buzz Aldrin, his Apollo 11 crewmate, wants us to leapfrog on to Mars. But Dr Marc Millis wants us to go a bit further - a hundred million times further, to be exact.

Rather than dipping a toe in the shallows of our own solar system, Millis - a top space scientist and the lead propulsion physicist for Nasa (they work out how to make spaceships fly) - used the 40th anniversary of the first Moon landing to urge the world to take the collective plunge into deep space.

He says the trek to other worlds is arduous but unless we start now to develop a form of technology which lets humans to travel light years in a lifetime, we will be squandering the greatest challenge to humankind yet.
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The technological windfall to humanity of space travel is huge. The 1969 moonshot gave us everything from Teflon to tennis shoes. As the scientific community's most vociferous advocate for research into interstellar flight, Millis has set up a new scientific foundation to explore how we could cross the mind-boggling abyss.

The Tau Zero Foundation

From the inspirations of science fiction through the realities of humanity's first deep space probes, the technical aspects of interstellar flight are examined. Focusing first on spacecraft engines, other issues like reliability, communication, navigation, and eventually human life support are also on the docket. The Tau Zero Foundation works on the seemingly simple solar sails through the seemingly impossible faster-than-light travel.

As profoundly important as it would be to give humanity access to another habitable planet, the implications are complex. There are many deep questions about our place in the Universe left to ponder. What effect would such a quest have on society today? What if other intelligent life is discovered? What have we learned from our prior extensions into new realms? Is science fiction more than just entertainment?

http://www.tauzero.aero


Centauri Dreams

In Centauri Dreams, Paul Gilster looks at peer-reviewed research on deep space exploration, with an eye toward interstellar possibilities. For the last three years, this site has coordinated its efforts with the Tau Zero Foundation, and now serves as the Foundation's news forum. In the logo above, the leftmost star is Alpha Centauri, a triple system closer than any other star, and surely a primary target for early interstellar probes. To its right is Beta Centauri (not a part of the Alpha Centauri system), with Alpha, Beta and Gamma Crucis, three of the stars forming the Southern Cross, visible at the far right (background image: Marco Lorenzi).

http://www.centauri-dreams.org

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Space
• exploration
• Destination
• the
• Alpha
• Centauri
• star
• system
• travel
• solar
• advanced
• propulsion
• alien
• contact
• Tau
• Zero
• Foundation
• nasa
• interstellar
• aliens
• extraterestrials

[rbolo29]

We may be on a revolution in understanding how to travel faster than light speed.

Moving Dimensions Theory may have that answer along with achievements at the Large Hadron Collider.

[melbourneopera]

Cool, hope that somebody can colonize that Solar system some day, if possible

[Scrumpilump2000]

Why haven't human beings built a lunar space station yet?

[DrRabbitz]

Watch for the mindworms! Awful things!

[hameed]

@rbolo29 no

[TheKingXXIV]

@mrdean3 @Helge129 Yeah but that's in the 22nd Century:the technology they have then is far superior to what we have now.

[mrdean3]

@Helge129 6 years. Haven't you ever watched 'Avatar'? rofl! ; )

[HARClX]

@amicrowaveoven because we dont have telescopes/techmology strong enougt to detect planets that far. stars -yes, but not planets

[spacepatrolman]

@csbob2004 A scientist said with the amount of overpopulation and the lack of recourses on the earth the enire history of the human race will be a bitter struggling for survival

[SuperColonel77]

The thing that really matters is first using Anti Matter and then using Hibernation but its not that easy they will have one more thing Artificial gravity. By now you already know that Earth's resources are running out at an Alarming rate. So it would be wiser that we start on Mars and and the Moon to mine things like Iron. In fact Earth's resources came from Asteroids crahing on our planet long ago and Asteroids seem like the most easiest job to do. By gosh i would sign up right away

[Helge129]

@jeffrey200800 You don`t need FTL to fly to another star - with solar sails, Apha Centauri is probably about 10 years away.

[jeffrey200800]

@melbourneopera Maybe there is already civilization in this solar system. Anyway, as long as we don't have the interdimensionnal propulsion there is no way to reach this!