For many centuries, there has been a fantasy of exploring the depths of space and establishing human civilisation on an other planet.
There have long been proponents of exploring (and even settling on) the majority of stars in the universe, which are expected to contain their own system of planets.
With the onset of the Space Age, this concept was investigated scientifically and was no longer merely the subject of science fiction. Unfortunately, there are several obstacles in the way of travelling beyond Earth to another star system.
When it comes to sending crewed expeditions to exoplanets, there are only two options. Creating sophisticated propulsion systems capable of reaching relativistic speeds—a small portion of the speed of light—is the first step.
The second is creating spaceships, also known as a Generation Ship (or Worldship), that can house personnel for generations.
A design competition for crewed interstellar travel using generation ships that will utilise present and near-future technologies was started by Project Hyperion on November 1st, 2024. A total of $10,000 (USD) will be given away for creative ideas in this public competition.
Architects, engineers, anthropologists, and urban planners make up the multinational, multidisciplinary team behind Project Hyperion.
Many of them have collaborated with organisations and agencies such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the ESA, and NASA.
The Initiative for Interstellar Studies (i4is), a UK-incorporated non-profit organisation devoted to research that will facilitate human and robotic exploration as well as the colonisation of exoplanets around neighbouring stars, is sponsoring their competition.
Although the idea for an interstellar spacecraft dates back to the early Space Age, the last 20 years have seen a significant increase in interest in the topic.
The recent surge in the number of exoplanets in our galaxy—which now total 5,787 verified planets in 4,325 star systems—is mostly to blame for this. Ideas like the Genesis Project, Swarming Proxima Centauri, and Breakthrough Starshot serve as examples of this.
Instead of taking years or millennia to complete the journey, these ideas use gram-scale spacecraft, lightsails, and directed energy (lasers) to reach speeds of up to 20% of the speed of light.
It is much more difficult to launch crewed spacecraft to other star systems with enough people to live on a different planet. A spacecraft using known or technically possible propulsion techniques would take 1,000 to 81,000 years to reach even the closest star (Proxima Centauri), as discussed in a previous article.
Proxima Centauri might theoretically be reached in 36 to 85 years by some cutting-edge concepts like Project Orion, Daedalus, and Icarus, however the expenses and quantity of propellant required are prohibitive.
Choosing to stay around for the long haul, which could take decades or even millennia, is an alternative to these “go fast” ideas. To do this, a spacecraft large enough to hold hundreds (or thousands) of people over several generations is required.
The crews will have to cultivate a large portion of their own food and rely on bioregenerative life support technologies in order to conserve space and lower the mass of cargo space. To put it briefly, in order for the passengers to live comfortably and healthily until they arrived at their destination, the ship would need to be self-sustaining.
Andreas Hein, an Associate Professor of Aerospace Engineering at the University of Luxembourg and the Chief Scientist at the Interdisciplinary Centre for Security, Reliability and Trust, is part of the Hyperion Project’s Organizing Committee. As he told Universe Today via email: “Think about the difference between a drone and an ocean liner. Previous designs for interstellar spacecraft, such as Orion, Daedalus, and Icarus, focused on uncrewed probes with the primary objective of gathering scientific data from target star systems, including searching for signs of life. In contrast, generation ships are designed to transport a crew, with the primary goal of settling an exoplanet or other celestial body in the target star system. They also tend to be much larger than interstellar probes, though they would likely use similar propulsion systems, such as fusion-based propulsion.”
