Breakthrough Starshot is currently developing a laser-powered lightsail that could possibly reach Alpha Centauri in a mere 20-years. If successful, it will study Proxima b, the nearest Earth-like planet found to date, located 4.22-light-years from our planet. The lightsail would travel at 20% the speed of light using new advances in laser technologies. This means a ground-based laser array measuring 0.4 square miles with an output of 100 gigawatts is required. Read more for a video and additional informatio.
This won’t be a gigantic spacecraft, but rather a “nanocraft” that weighs just 1-gram, propelled to 20% the speed of light by lightsails measuring a few hundred atoms thick and about a meter wide. Continuous acceleration could theoretically allow such a spacecraft to reach extremely high speeds without any fuel, according to tests conducted by researchers. A laser system would essentially focus light on the sails and accelerate them to the target speed within minutes.
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Now, given the discovery of this planet, we may send the spacecraft to fly by and to measure the atmosphere, composition and also to check the physical composition of the planet to see whether there’s life there,” said Thiem Hoang, a postdoctoral researcher at the Canadian Institute of Theoretical Physics who is an informal member of the Breakthrough Starshot scientific collaboration.
