Interstellar Travel

[Voyager275]

Do you think we will be capable of interstellar travel within this century? If so how? And if not, why?

[Rakaydos]

No because it's taken 50 years for Voyager to get to interstellar space, and I dont see us launching another expedition in the next 35 years.

[Voyager275]

What if we are able to harness antimatter? Then 6 years to Alpha Centauri

[shirty]

saw u link this on DasV channel.

the question is lacking detail.

technically we already have achieved interstellar travel, voyager is no longer in our system which means its travelling thru interstellar space.

if you mean complete an interstellar journey then not a chance within this century, i have doubts it'll ever happen considering the requirements that it would need to travel the 4.2 light years to proxima centauri.

Also unless we find a way to see if its worth going we wont be heading out there.

[Rakaydos]

All the particle accelerators in the world would take decades to produce even a single gram of antimatter, and our storage techniques cant handle containing antimater for that kind of delay. Not this century.

[UmbralRaptor]

I see nothing impossible about a probe making use of a high performance nuclear pulse system launching to a nearby star in the late 21st century. I also see no plausible reason that it will happen that soon.

edit: as in the launch date, not necessarily arrival. See below for related issues.

Edited May 19, 2015 by UmbralRaptor

[baggers]

At 1% ligth-speed, it take 500 years to go to proxima centaury.

At 10%, 50 years. More reseonable. We need 30 000 000 m/s DeltaV So, the launch will be for 2050, you have 35 years for finding that.

(Oh, I forgot: double DeltaV, for braking and circularize/exploration purposes at the target)

(and a good IA, at least capable of close-orbiting any planet, interplanetary travel and taking some surface surveys)

(and if you really want to know if your interstallar travel is a success before the end of the century, lauch at least 5 years before for the "touchdown!" signal travel back to earth)

Edited May 19, 2015 by baggers

[Nibb31]

Not in this century. It is likely that interstellar travel can never be practical, which would explain the Fermi paradox.

[baggers]

Not in this century. It is likely that interstellar travel can never be practical, which would explain the Fermi paradox.

Even in the worst case of interstellar travel, we are certainly able to launch some automated/A.I probes in the very near stellar systems.

[K^2]

Not in this century. It is likely that interstellar travel can never be practical, which would explain the Fermi paradox.

Or practicality simply drops with distance faster than inverse R-square. That's certainly the case with conventional propulsion.

[SargeRho]

Wouldn't in-space resource mining make it viable to construct a sort of interstellar highway, consisting of giant lasers or particle cannons, built and maintained by automated spacecraft, which in turn are also built in Space in part or in whole, as well as ships to make use of those beams? Of course, there would need to be some kind of justification to travel between Stars. Habitable worlds maybe?

As far as I can tell, it's simply a problem of needing ungodly amounts of energy, or fuel. But if you can leave a major part of that fuel or energy at home, it becomes a lot easier, doesn't it?

Edited May 19, 2015 by SargeRho

[Hcube]

Wouldn't in-space resource mining make it viable to construct a sort of interstellar highway, consisting of giant lasers or particle cannons, built and maintained by automated spacecraft, which in turn are also built in Space in part or in whole, as well as ships to make use of those beams? Of course, there would need to be some kind of justification to travel between Stars. Habitable worlds maybe?

As far as I can tell, it's simply a problem of needing ungodly amounts of energy, or fuel. But if you can leave a major part of that fuel or energy at home, it becomes a lot easier, doesn't it?

Yoko Tsuno ?

[SargeRho]

I don't get the reference.

[Mitchz95]

The optimist in me says maybe. The realist in me says no.

Still, anything's possible. I'm sure the Wright Brothers never thought we'd be going to the Moon sixty years after their first flight.

[ChrisSpace]

Will we launch an interstellar probe within this century - maybe

Will we launch an interstellar probe this century that will take less than 1000 years to reach its destination - no

Will we launch an interstellar probe next century that will take less than 1000 years to reach its destination - probably

[K^2]

"It is a big day today on Tau Ceti as humanity greets the interstellar probe launched from Earth almost a thousand years ago..."

[baggers]

Will we launch an interstellar probe this century that will take less than 1000 years to reach its destination - no

Will we launch an interstellar probe next century that will take less than 1000 years to reach its destination - probably

May seem a waste (as the XXII century probe will certainly reach its destination before the XXI century probe), but if you don't R&D and launch the XXI century probe, you will certainly not be able to launch the more technology advanced XXII probe.

So, we have to keep going.

[cicatrix]

Even if we have technology which we don't it's still hardly possible. There must be economic reasons behind it. We haven't even explored the Solar system. There are centuries of work ahead just to explore the neighboring space. Then, perhaps, we might be in position to start thinking about interstellar travel.

[baggers]

Even if we have technology which we don't it's still hardly possible. There must be economic reasons behind it. We haven't even explored the Solar system. There are centuries of work ahead just to explore the neighboring space. Then, perhaps, we might be in position to start thinking about interstellar travel.

Why not go both ways?

[cicatrix]

Why not go both ways?

One step at a time. Space is big, huge, enormously vast. We sent Voyager 37 years ago and it's still on the outskirts of the Solar system. I don't expect any breakthrough in propulsion methods in the near future so, velocities of about 100-150 km/s will probably be our limit for quite some time (very optimistic estimation). You can calculate the time needed to reach Proxima Centauri at this speed yourself.

[K^2]

I still have fingers crossed for sub-light warp within a century. If we find a gravitomagnetic analog of superconductivity, it should be manageable. Totally useless for manned interstellar flight, but it'd get us buzzing about the Sol system, and probes could reach near destination stars in decades.

[Frozen_Heart]

I put possibly. With current or forseen technology then so, if we have a breakthrough then yes.

[FishInferno]

I think that if we really wanted to develop interstellar travel in this century, we could. But I see us pouring resources into colonizing Mars before we invest in interstellar exploration.

[Karriz]

Maybe we'll send an interstellar probe by the end of the century using some kind of super-efficient propulsion, but it'll take centuries to arrive to it's destination.

[baggers]

I'm not sure we will launch a "real" insterstellar probe this century (Voyager-like doesn't count) unless we can afford a travel-time to next star of less than 4-5 decades. At 1% ligth-speed and 500 years to Proxima centaury, it's really no need to rush.