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This sounds like moonshot-level complexity. It invokes solar sails, laser communication at 550 AU, as well as "advanced propulsion, lightweight telescopes, memb
by coldnose 9y ago
This sounds like moonshot-level complexity. It invokes solar sails, laser communication at 550 AU, as well as "advanced propulsion, lightweight telescopes, membrane mirrors, inflatable/rigidizeable structures, and novel coronagraphic techniques." All that for a telescope you can't aim...
- IntronExon 9y agoMoonshot x Manhattan Project with a dash of Star Trek. Basically we need the next few generations of novel materials, and controlled fusion reactions. Assuming no major setbacks for humans, we’d need more than a century before considering this kind of project. It would be a worthy project, although I wonder if some other tech might not supersede it by the time this was ready? Gravitational astronomy is just getting started after all, and who knows, maybe the dream of neutrino astronomy could happen.
- skew 9y agoInteresting that you mention neutrino astronomy - if you mean imaging, I don't know of anything but gravity that could focus neutrinos.