The famous British physicist Stephen Hawking has a large number of fans in China. On April 12, as soon as Mr. Hawking’s official Weibo was launched, Chinese netizens went crazy laser pointer, and their fans quickly reached more than 2 million. May I ask who has such an aura? Not only that, Elder Hawking also made a big promotion with the help of Weibo.
On April 13th, Hawking brought an exciting news on his second Weibo-the launch of the “Breakthrough Star” program, which will send a miniature flying probe to Alpha Centauri, 4 light-years away. . Russian billionaire Yuri Milner, one of the initiators of the plan, invested US$100 million in the project.
What kind of plan is this? How will it be achieved? The speed is 1,000 times that of the fastest spacecraft currently. The “Breakthrough Photostar” project is like this: Within a generation, the “Breakthrough Photostar” aims to develop a “nano-aircraft”: an automated space probe with a mass of gram, and a green laser pointer beam It is pushed to one-fifth the speed of light, or 100 million miles per hour, which is 1,000 times the fastest spacecraft currently.
If successful, the flyby mission will reach the habitable zone near Alpha Centauri, 4.37 light-years away from the Earth, about 20 years after launch, and use its cameras, communication equipment, and processors to capture planets and other scientific data. The image of it will be transmitted back to Earth in 4 years.
Why go to Alpha Centauri? Because Alpha Centauri is the closest constellation to the Earth, astronomers believe that a planet similar to the Earth may exist in the habitable zone of Alpha Centauri, which is the galaxy closest to the Earth. In other words, you can go there to check whether there are aliens or an environment suitable for human living.
If you use traditional spacecraft technology, it will take 30,000 years to reach the Centaur. At that time, whether human beings still existed on the earth or not? Therefore, countless space exploration fans before saw this fact in their hearts. Now with the plan of “breaking through the star”, the time has been shortened so much at once. Isn’t it exciting?