PROJECT HYPERION FEATURES A SPACESHIP THAT WOULD TRANSPORT THOUSANDS TO CLOSEST STAR SYSTEM
What would an expedition to explore other galaxies entail? Scientists have been brainstorming and proposing concepts for deep space travel to the Project Hyperion Design Competition for years. Even though the winning entry this year is still mostly a hypothetical strategy, it appears to have a rather well-developed response.
The Chrysalis, the spacecraft featured in the winning idea, would be 36 miles long. On a one-way space journey to Proxima Centauri b, the closest potentially habitable exoplanet in Alpha Centauri, a separate star system, it might hold up to 2,400 people. It would take about 400 years to travel the 25 trillion miles to reach this system.
As the population changes over the course of the lengthy journey, the engineers of the Chrysalis designed the spacecraft to accommodate intergenerational habitation. With living quarters, food production, warehouse storage, and other amenities spread over the spacecraft's layers, it would resemble a nesting doll design. Each of these levels would be powered by nuclear fusion reactors, and the spacecraft would be continuously rotating to maintain artificial gravity. According to the project's designers, construction would take 20 to 25 years.
The design brief said that the shuttle to take the passengers of the Chrysalis to Proxima Centauri b and communication equipment would be located in the centre of the spaceship. A layer for social areas would come next, then a layer for housing, a layer for work/industry, a layer for storage warehouses, and a layer for various types of food production.
In-depth planning is also included in the design brief to guarantee the best possible survival on board. In order to verify the mental health of prospective passengers as they are ready to spend the remainder of their lives aboard a spaceship, one such precaution requires the first generation to reside in a remote colony in Antarctica for 70 to 80 years before boarding the Chrysalis. The engineers working on Project Chrysalis even considered how the spacecraft would be run daily, suggesting that a team of humans on board would collaborate with artificial intelligence to manage governance.
Even though Project Chrysalis is entirely speculative, engineers and scientists working on interstellar travel solutions might find some of its design elements useful. Certain components of the spacecraft's architecture, like nuclear fusion reactors, are not yet developed to the degree that the project expects. But ideas like Chrysalis encourage us to close the gap between conjecture and actuality with every new development, whether theoretical or practical.