The Voyager probes are the farthest human-made objects from Earth, both now in what is considered interstellar space. Meaning they’re not in the solar system anymore. However, experts have now submitted a couple of proposals for another space probe that would utterly eclipse those, one that would travel to another star system.
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00:00The Voyager probes are the farthest most human-made objects from Earth, both now in what is considered
00:09interstellar space, aka not in the solar system anymore.
00:13However, experts have now submitted a couple of proposals for another space probe that
00:17would utterly eclipse those, ones that would travel to another star system.
00:21The first involves a tiny probe in a solar wing that would allow the spacecraft to ride
00:25a beam of light to Alpha Centauri.
00:27The spacecraft would have to be so small, however, that it would simply be able to travel
00:31there without the ability to gather much, if any, data.
00:34Conversely, another proposal looks to send a probe the size of the Voyager crafts, or
00:38around 2200 pounds, with lasers.
00:40The idea would be to set up the spacecraft with a cosmic sail one Earthlings could then
00:45point a powerful laser at.
00:46Current tech limitations mean we can only push it for around 0.1 astronomical units
00:51of its journey, or about 0.1 the distance of the Earth to the Sun, and Alpha Centauri
00:55is around 277,000 astronomical units.
00:59That's why they're working on a relativistic electron beam to focus the laser.
01:03If all things come together as theorized, they say they could push a craft for a distance
01:07of between 100 to 1,000 astronomical units, pushing the spacecraft to speeds upwards of
01:1210% the speed of light, with a total travel time to Alpha Centauri of only around 40 years.