Space initiative brings Zuckerberg, Stephen Hawking and Yuri Milner together

Space, Stephen Hawking, Yuri Milner, Breakthrough prize, Alpha Centauri, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook, Nanocraft, Mars, space exploration, Breakthrough Starshot

In a statement issued on his Facebook account Mark Zuckerberg declared that he is joining a space initiative that will have names like Yuri Milner and Stephen Hawking as well. Here is his full statement:

I’m proud to join Yuri Milner and Stephen Hawking for a new space initiative to go beyond our nearby planets to explore other stars for the first time in human history.

Our nearest star, Alpha Centauri, is 4.3 light years or about 25 trillion miles away. Even with today’s fastest spacecraft, it would take 30,000 years to get there. That’s too long.

The new idea here is that instead of using large spacecraft burning fuel like people have in all traditional space travel, we’re going to create a fleet of tiny spacecraft — or nanocraft — that we can accelerate to 20% of the speed of light using an array of laser beams from our planet’s surface. At that speed of 100 million miles per hour, it will only take 20 years to reach Alpha Centauri. This is a completely new way to think about space travel and exploration.

The reason this project is important is recent research has found many stars have planets within a distance where they could have water to sustain life. That is, they’re close enough to their star that any water isn’t frozen but not so close that it has all evaporated. But just because a planet is in this habitable zone doesn’t mean it has water and is a place we can actually live. For example, Mars has no water, so it would be difficult to ever live there. It’s quite possible the closest planet that humans could actually live on is orbiting Alpha Centauri, and the only way to know that for sure is to visit close enough to photograph the planet, which is what this project will do.

Over the years, Yuri and I have worked on a number of science initiatives together, including creating the Breakthrough Prize. I’m excited to support this latest initiative with Stephen Hawking, and to help bring human space exploration to the stars.

I’m proud to join Yuri Milner and Stephen Hawking for a new space initiative to go beyond our nearby planets to explore other stars for the first time in human history.

Our nearest star, Alpha Centauri, is 4.3 light years or about 25 trillion miles away. Even with today’s fastest spacecraft, it would take 30,000 years to get there. That’s too long.

The new idea here is that instead of using large spacecraft burning fuel like people have in all traditional space travel, we’re going to create a fleet of tiny spacecraft — or nanocraft — that we can accelerate to 20% of the speed of light using an array of laser beams from our planet’s surface. At that speed of 100 million miles per hour, it will only take 20 years to reach Alpha Centauri. This is a completely new way to think about space travel and exploration.

The reason this project is important is recent research has found many stars have planets within a distance where they could have water to sustain life. That is, they’re close enough to their star that any water isn’t frozen but not so close that it has all evaporated. But just because a planet is in this habitable zone doesn’t mean it has water and is a place we can actually live. For example, Mars has no water, so it would be difficult to ever live there. It’s quite possible the closest planet that humans could actually live on is orbiting Alpha Centauri, and the only way to know that for sure is to visit close enough to photograph the planet, which is what this project will do.

Over the years, Yuri and I have worked on a number of science initiatives together, including creating the Breakthrough Prize. I’m excited to support this latest initiative with Stephen Hawking, and to help bring human space exploration to the stars.

Stephen Hawking also wrote: In a statement issued on his Facebook account Mark Zuckerberg declared that he is joining a space initiative that will have names like Yuri Milner and Stephen hawking as well. Here is his full statement:

I’m proud to join Yuri Milner and Stephen Hawking for a new space initiative to go beyond our nearby planets to explore other stars for the first time in human history.

Our nearest star, Alpha Centauri, is 4.3 light years or about 25 trillion miles away. Even with today’s fastest spacecraft, it would take 30,000 years to get there. That’s too long.

The new idea here is that instead of using large spacecraft burning fuel like people have in all traditional space travel, we’re going to create a fleet of tiny spacecraft — or nanocraft — that we can accelerate to 20% of the speed of light using an array of laser beams from our planet’s surface. At that speed of 100 million miles per hour, it will only take 20 years to reach Alpha Centauri. This is a completely new way to think about space travel and exploration.

The reason this project is important is recent research has found many stars have planets within a distance where they could have water to sustain life. That is, they’re close enough to their star that any water isn’t frozen but not so close that it has all evaporated. But just because a planet is in this habitable zone doesn’t mean it has water and is a place we can actually live. For example, Mars has no water, so it would be difficult to ever live there. It’s quite possible the closest planet that humans could actually live on is orbiting Alpha Centauri, and the only way to know that for sure is to visit close enough to photograph the planet, which is what this project will do.

Over the years, Yuri and I have worked on a number of science initiatives together, including creating the Breakthrough Prize. I’m excited to support this latest initiative with Stephen Hawking, and to help bring human space exploration to the stars.

I’m proud to join Yuri Milner and Stephen Hawking for a new space initiative to go beyond our nearby planets to explore other stars for the first time in human history.

Our nearest star, Alpha Centauri, is 4.3 light years or about 25 trillion miles away. Even with today’s fastest spacecraft, it would take 30,000 years to get there. That’s too long.

The new idea here is that instead of using large spacecraft burning fuel like people have in all traditional space travel, we’re going to create a fleet of tiny spacecraft — or nanocraft — that we can accelerate to 20% of the speed of light using an array of laser beams from our planet’s surface. At that speed of 100 million miles per hour, it will only take 20 years to reach Alpha Centauri. This is a completely new way to think about space travel and exploration.

The reason this project is important is recent research has found many stars have planets within a distance where they could have water to sustain life. That is, they’re close enough to their star that any water isn’t frozen but not so close that it has all evaporated. But just because a planet is in this habitable zone doesn’t mean it has water and is a place we can actually live. For example, Mars has no water, so it would be difficult to ever live there. It’s quite possible the closest planet that humans could actually live on is orbiting Alpha Centauri, and the only way to know that for sure is to visit close enough to photograph the planet, which is what this project will do.

Over the years, Yuri and I have worked on a number of science initiatives together, including creating the Breakthrough Prize. I’m excited to support this latest initiative with Stephen Hawking, and to help bring human space exploration to the stars.

Stephen Hawkings also expressed his delight in a previous message:

Today, at the One World Observatory in New York City, Yuri Milner and I launched a mission to the stars. Mark Zuckerberg lent his support by joining the board of our new initiative, Breakthrough Starshot.

Within the next generation, Breakthrough Starshot aims to develop a ‘nanocraft’ – a gram-scale robotic space probe – and use a light beam to push it to 20 percent of the speed of light. If we are successful, a flyby mission could reach Alpha Centauri about 20 years after launch, and send back images of any planets discovered in the system.

Albert Einstein once imagined riding on a light beam, and his thought experiment led him to the theory of special relativity. A little over a century later, we have the chance to attain a significant fraction of that speed: 100 million miles an hour. Only by going that fast can we reach the stars on the time-scale of a human life.

It is exciting to be involved in such an ambitious project, pushing the boundaries of ingenuity and engineering.