Project Icarus (Interstellar Probe Design Study)

The Icarus Project is a follow-up study of the project Daedalus, which was initiated by the British Interplanetary Society and the Tau Zero Foundation joint on 30 September 2009. The study, which is to run until 2014, the interstellar unmanned spacecraft Daedalus will be revised. A main attention is paid to the fusion drive, the technology maturity is to be increased further in the end.

The name of the project Icarus is inspired by Greek mythology, in which Icarus " touched the sky " before it got too close to the sun and fell back to earth. The intention of the project is that Icarus " touch" the star is ( flyby of a star system ).

Background

Incentive to revise the concept Daedalus is the technological development of the last 30 years and the publication of further drive concept studies. Apart from the technological progress in the merger by means of magnetic confinement or inertial confinement fusion since the late 1990s, many extrasolar planets have been discovered. Based on the previous findings, the distance should be increased to 12 light-years in the study. This allows the exploration of a possible 20 candidates, including Epsilon Eridani and Tau Ceti.

Constraints of the study

The following projects, the study has set itself:

The following boundary conditions were set:

Others

Although the (main) drive system of the spacecraft should be based on nuclear fusion, there are considerations with solar sails provide certain mission sections or possibly space probes ( sun- or laser- based).