Scientists think there might be one or more Earth - like planets in our nearest star system , Alpha Centauri , 4.37 light - years away . And to find out for sure , an organization is fund a new instrument to hunt for such worlds – forward of a possible mission to the star system in the 2030s .
This is thanks toan agreementbetween the European Southern Observatory ( ESO ) and the Breakthrough Initiatives . The latter is working on a mission to send out little spacecraft call " nanocraft " to Proxima Centauri , the third and faintest star of the Alpha Centauri system , as part of theirBreakthrough Starshotinitiative .
To get to the Alpha Centauri organisation , Breakthrough Starshot would involve equipping these midget chip - sized nanocraft with large laser sails . A hefty laser on Earth would then be fired at the sail , accelerate the mini space vehicle up to 20 percent the speed of light . At this speed , the journeying to Alpha Centauri could be made in just 20 years .
Working with ESO , the Breakthrough Initiatives ( backed by Russian billionaire Yuri Milner ) are choke to bring home the bacon fund to upgrade an legal instrument on the Very Large Telescope ( VLT ) in Chile . shout out theVLT Imager and Spectrometer for mid - infrared(VISIR ) , the official document – as its name suggest – observes stars in mid - infrared wavelengths , allowing the presence of a planet to be remark by lowering the brightness gap between the star and the satellite .
However , planets still appear millions of time dimmer than their host star , even with this proficiency . So this modish ontogeny will see the Breakthrough Initiatives pay for rising slope that expend adaptative optics and coronagraphy to dilute the stellar light . The latter regard using a coronagraph to block out the star ’s visible light , wee-wee planets easier to distinguish . As part of the agreement , ESO will begin bet for planet in the Alpha Centauri system from 2019 .
Of naturally , we already know of at least one major planet in this system . Last yr , it was announced that a planet calledProxima bhad been found around Proxima Centauri , and it may be an Earth - similar world . This revelation came soon after Breakthrough Starshot was announced , adding excitement about the military mission . A separate go-ahead , calledProject Blue , is attempting to directly image planets around the other two stars in the system , Alpha Centauri A and B , by 2022 .
Observing satellite on our cosmic threshold would be a major breakthrough . We ’ve come up thousands of planets elsewhere in the galaxy , but get worlds invitingly within reach would be hugely exciting . And , who have sex , we might just go there in the not too distant future .
