The probes will be tiny, pellet-like wafers containing many valuable instruments and weighing only a few grams each. The goal of the project is to take photos and collect other valuable data on the exoplanet and send it back to Earth to see if Proxima Centauri b is indeed habitable or, even better, already inhabited. The proposal, called Breakthrough Starshot, would send thousands of tiny probes 4 light-years away to Proxima Centauri, the closest star to Earth other than the Sun.Д«esides its distance, Proxima Centauri is a prime target because it contains an Earthlike exoplanet called Proxima Centauri b (aka Proxima b) orbiting in the habitable zone. The idea to propel spacecraft to extreme speeds using powerful laser beams has received the support of many powerful people, including Mark Zuckerberg and the late Stephen Hawking. At present, we do not have the technology to create sufficient amounts of it. Unfortunately, antimatter is incredibly difficult to synthesize. It is estimated that a ship propelled by antimatter annihilations could travel at 40 percent of the speed of light. In an antimatter rocket, these pions would be used as a propellant and then expelled from the ship before they completely convert to energy. A majority of these particles are called pions. However, before all the mass has been converted to pure energy, a few short-lived particles are created as products of the reaction. To give you perspective, the largest nuclear bombs today convert 0.1 percent of their mass to energy. One hundred percent of the particlesвЂ™ mass is converted into a tsunami of energy. The reason: If a particle of antimatter comes into contact with a particle of regular matter, they will annihilate each other in an astonishing explosion. What does antimatter look like? You have never seen it because it is only synthesized in laboratories.

A proton has a positive charge, and an antiproton has a negative charge. Spacecraft that scoop up hydrogen as they go are called ramjets.ДЄ particle of antimatter has the opposite properties of its regular matter counterpart. The hydrogen can be stored on board or collected from the interstellar medium (the matter and radiation that exists between stars) as the ship travels. These are expelled from the spacecraft by a nozzle, accelerating the spacecraft to a ridiculous 90 million kilometers per hour (55.9 million mph).

The thermal energy released from the fusion is transferred to the surrounding atoms, accelerating them. Using high-powered lasers or magnets, hydrogen is compressed and heated until fusion ignites.

Several designs for interstellar spacecraft capitalize on hydrogen fusion. The most common form is hydrogen fusion, which creates helium. A by-product of this reaction is tremendous amounts of thermal energy.ДЇusion is a far more powerful and energetic process than fission (when nuclear bombs split atoms). Under these conditions, light atoms fuse together to make heavier ones. Fusion happens when atoms are subjected to extreme temperatures and pressures. Nuclear fusion is a process that occurs in the cores of all stars and is the source of each starвЂ™s heat. In addition, ion propulsion systems glow bright blue, making them look exactly like the spaceships in space operas. There, they are shot out of the spacecraft at tremendous speeds, pushing the spacecraft as they do so.ДЄs a propellant, xenon is extremely efficient and can be stored in vast quantities, making it an amazing fuel source.

Using a negatively charged grid, the ions are attracted toward holes at the end of the chamber. The like charges of the ions in the chamber push against each other, accelerating the ions. ДЄs the electrons collide with the xenon atoms, the xenon atoms have some of their electrons knocked off, making a positively charged atom (a positive ion). Then a stream of electrons is injected into the chamber using simple electricity generated by solar panels or nuclear reactors. The process starts by injecting an inert gas, usually xenon, into an ionization chamber. Ion propulsion works by taking advantage of the electrostatic properties of particles (the tendency for particles with like charges to repel and opposite charges to attract). This spacecraft would be better suited for exploring the outer solar system. The idea behind this engine is to constantly accelerate the rocket so that it will attain a significant velocity up to 145,000 kilometers per hour (90,000 mph) after several years.Д®ven so, this is not nearly enough speed to reach the nearest stars. Rockets based on ion propulsion produce far less thrust than conventional rockets.ДЄlthough conventional rockets stop accelerating as soon as they leave Earth, ion propulsion rockets can continue propelling the rocket for decades on end. Ion propulsion is a type of engine that has undergone serious development over the past few years.

Interstellar rocket league