The "Icarus" Bashny.Net

Back in the 70s of the last century, the best scientists and engineers from around the world worked on the project "Daedalus", involves the creation of a spaceship that can fly to Bernard's Star - the second close, after Alpha Centauri star to Earth. In 1977, the project was closed, but resumed again recently, but under the name "Icarus".
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For five years, from 1973 to 1977, the team worked on the development and detailed study of the spacecraft, which could reach the stars Bernard, at a distance of six light-years from Earth. This unmanned interstellar cruiser working on a pulsed fusion engine, powered by deuterium mixed with lithium-3 needed to achieve it for "some" fifty years, which is less than one average human life.



Although spaceship "Daedalus", of course, was never built, while working on them, scientists have made many discoveries and inventions that have spent decades of their interpretation and application.



And now, while Russian scientists are working on creation of the first private space station, scientists from NASA and the BIS (British Interplanetary Society) announced the launch of the "Icarus", which, as the name implies, will be the "heir" "Daedalus". Above it began work about twenty specialists in various branches of science, and their number is constantly increasing.



The ultimate goal of "Icarus", like its predecessor, is not to create a real spaceship, and to expand our understanding of the possibilities of interstellar travel, to make society believe in their reality. Moreover, the end point of the work is to create the most realistic and detailed drawings of the ship, which is quite possible to be built in the near future, given current technologies and those technologies that will very soon.



Work on the "Icarus", in fact, it has just started (going from the beginning of 2010), and therefore it is too early to talk about any scientific and engineering breakthroughs, or at least the intermediate achievements. From the official information currently available to the facts that the goal of "Icarus" was replaced, as compared to the "Daedalus". And it will not star Bernard and Proxima Eridani, located at a distance of ten light-years away. And it will take longer to achieve fifty years, and one hundred percent.



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