An artist's conception of the British Interplanetary Society design for Project Daedalus

Project Daedalus was a study conducted between 1973 and 1978 by the British Interplanetary Society to design a plausible interstellar unmanned spacecraft. A dozen scientists and engineers led by Alan Bond worked on the project, and settled on proposing a fusion rocket as its drive. Image File history File links Project Daedalus was a study conducted between 1973 and 1978 by the British Interplanetary Society This is a screenshot of a copyrighted website, video game graphic, computer program graphic, television broadcast, or film. ... Image File history File links Project Daedalus was a study conducted between 1973 and 1978 by the British Interplanetary Society This is a screenshot of a copyrighted website, video game graphic, computer program graphic, television broadcast, or film. ... The British Interplanetary Society (BIS) founded in 1933 by Mr. ... Artists depiction of a hypothetical Wormhole Induction Propelled Spacecraft, based loosely on the 1994 warp drive paper of Miguel Alcubierre. ... Unmanned space missions are those using remote-controlled spacecraft. ... Alan Bond (born 1944) is Managing Director of Reaction Engines Ltd [1] and associated with Project Daedalus, Blue Streak missile, HOTOL and Skylon. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ...

The design criteria had specified that the spacecraft had to use current or near-future technology and had to be able to reach its destination within a human lifetime (a flight time of 50 years was allocated). However, as noted above, it was not to be manned, being intended mainly as a scientific probe.

The target chosen was Barnard's Star, 5.9 light years away, which at the time was believed to possess at least one planet (the evidence on which this belief was based has since been discredited). However, the design was required to be flexible enough that it could be sent to any of a number of other target stars. Barnards Star is a very low-mass star in the constellation Ophiuchus which was discovered by the astronomer E. E. Barnard in 1916. ... A light-year or lightyear (symbol: ly) is a unit of measurement of length, specifically the distance light travels in vacuum in one year. ...

Concept

Daedalus would be constructed in Earth orbit and have an initial mass of 54,000 tons, including 50,000 tons of fuel and 500 tons of scientific payload. Daedalus was to be a two-stage spacecraft. The first stage would operate for two years, taking the spacecraft to 7.1% of light speed (0.071 c), and then after it was jettisoned the second stage would fire for 1.8 years, bringing the spacecraft up to about 12% of light speed (0.12 c) before being shut down for a 46-year cruise period. Cherenkov effect in a swimming pool nuclear reactor. ...

This velocity was well beyond the capabilities of chemical rockets, or even the type of nuclear pulse propulsion studied during Project Orion. Instead, Daedalus would be propelled by a fusion rocket using pellets of deuterium/helium-3 mix that would be ignited in the reaction chamber by inertial confinement using electron beams. 250 pellets would be detonated per second, and the resulting plasma would be directed by a magnetic nozzle. A remote camera captures a close_up view of a Space Shuttle Main Engine during a test firing at the John C. Stennis Space Center in Hancock County, Mississippi Spacecraft propulsion is used to change the velocity of spacecraft and artificial satellites, or in short, to provide delta_v. ... An artists conception of the Orion basic spacecraft, powered by nuclear pulse propulsion. ... An artists conception of the NASA reference design for the Project Orion spacecraft powered by nuclear propulsion. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... Deuterium, also called heavy hydrogen, is a stable isotope of hydrogen with a natural abundance in the oceans of Earth of approximately one atom in 6500 of hydrogen (~154 PPM). ... Helium-3 is a non-radioactive and light isotope of helium. ... Inertial confinement fusion using lasers rapidly progressed in the late 1970s and early 1980s from being able to deliver only a few joules of laser energy (per pulse) to a fusion target to being able to deliver tens of kilojoules to a target. ... A charged particle beam is a group of electrically charged particles that have approximately the same kinetic energy and move in approximately the same direction. ... For other uses, see Plasma. ... This page is a candidate for speedy deletion. ...

The second stage would have two 5-meter optical telescopes and two 20-meter radio telescopes. About 25 years after launch these telescopes would begin examining the area around Barnard's Star to learn more about any accompanying planets. This information would be sent back to Earth, using the 40-meter diameter second stage engine bell as a communications dish, and targets of interest would be selected. Since the spacecraft would not decelerate upon reaching Barnard's Star, Daedalus would carry 18 autonomous sub-probes that would be launched between 7.2 and 1.8 years before the main craft entered the target system. These sub-probes would be propelled by nuclear-powered ion drives and carry cameras, spectrometers, and other sensory equipment. They would fly past their targets, still travelling at 12% of the speed of light, and transmit their findings back to the Daedalus second stage mothership. Eight Inch refracting telescope. ... The 64 meter radio telescope at Parkes Observatory A radio telescope is a form of directional radio antenna most often used in radio astronomy and in tracking and collecting data from satellites and space probes (see Deep Space Network), and are also used in the SETI project. ... In a nuclear electric rocket, nuclear thermal energy is changed into electrical energy that is used to power one of the electrical propulsion technologies. ... An ion engine test An ion thruster is a type of spacecraft propulsion that uses beams of ions for propulsion. ... A spectrometer is an optical instrument used to measure properties of light over a specific portion of the electromagnetic spectrum. ...

The ship's payload bay containing its sub-probes, telescopes, and other equipment would be protected from the interstellar medium during transit by a 50-ton 7 mm-thick beryllium disk. This erosion shield is made from beryllium due to its lightness and high latent heat of vaporisation. Larger obstacles that might be encountered while passing through the target system would be dispersed by an artificially generated cloud of particles some 200 km ahead of the vehicle. The spacecraft would carry a number of robot "wardens" capable of autonomously repairing damage or malfunctions. The interstellar medium (or ISM) is the name astronomers give to the tenuous gas and dust that pervade interstellar space. ... General Name, symbol, number beryllium, Be, 4 Chemical series alkaline earth metals Group, period, block 2, 2, s Appearance white-gray metallic Standard atomic weight 9. ... For other uses, see robot (disambiguation). ...

Daedalus Specifications

• Overall length: 190 meters
• Propellant mass first stage: 46,000 metric tons
• Propellant mass second stage: 4000 metric tons
• First stage mass empty mass: 1690 metric tons
• Second stage empty mass: 980 metric tons
• Engine burn time first stage: 2.05 years
• Engine burn time second stage: 1.76 years
• Thrust first stage: 754,000 Newtons
• Thrust second stage: 663,000 Newtons
• Engine exhaust velocity: 10,000km/s
• Payload mass: 450 tons

Variants

A quantitative engineering analysis of a self-replicating variation on Project Daedalus was published in 1980 by Robert Freitas.^[1] The non-replicating design was modified to include all subsystems necessary for self-replication, using the probe to deliver a "seed" factory with a mass of about 443 tons to a distant site, having the seed factory replicate many copies of itself there to increase its total manufacturing capacity, and then using the resulting automated industrial complex to construct more probes with a single seed factory on board each. A von Neumann probe is a specific example of a hypothetical concept based on the work of Hungarian-born American mathematician and physicist John von Neumann. ...

References

• Project Daedalus Study Group: A. Bond et al., Project Daedalus - The Final Report on the BIS Starship Study, JBIS Interstellar Studies, Supplement 1978

See also

• Project Longshot
• British Rail flying saucer

Project Longshot is a design for an interstellar spaceship, an unmanned probe intended to fly to Alpha Centauri powered by nuclear pulse propulsion. ... A diagram of the craft, taken from the patent application. ...

External links

• Project Daedalus, The Encyclopedia of Astrobiology Astronomy and Spaceflight
• Starship Daedalus
• Project Daedalus - Origins
• The Daedalus Starship