Engineers Reveal a Ship for Our First Interstellar Journey

0:00Welcome aboard the most innovative, powerful, and safe spacecraft, Chris Salis, which will take you to exoplanet Proxima Centauri B of the Alpha Centauri Star System. Thousands of brilliant minds have been working for decades to provide you with a comfortable journey through the depths of boundless space. You won't live to reach your destination, as the entire way takes more than 400 years. But rest assured, your descendants will reach Proxima Centauri B completely healthy. Now let me give you a tour of the ship and show you how it works. To ensure that living conditions on Chris Salis are as close as possible to those on Earth, scientists equip the ship with artificial gravity support. Thanks to the rotating hulls, you'll be able to walk here as if you're on your home planet, and the ship's length, a whopping 36 miles, will definitely ensure you take long walks.

1:00You can sit on a bench in the park where botanists have planted flowers and trees grown on board. You can visit a library or have lunch at a cafe. You can meet your friends in the evening, or you can spend time at home watching documentaries about wildlife. Maintaining an earthly standard of living on the ship is possible thanks to the operation of thermonuclear reactors and the unique design of Chris Salis. The whole ship is built like a nesting doll. Several layers of the ship cover one another and spin around the central core. Each layer is equipped with a fusion reactor and public spaces, farms, warehouses, natural parks, technical departments, and many other facilities. The center of the ship has communication equipment and shuttles that will take you to Proxima Centauri B, after Chris Salis approaches the upper layers of the planet's atmosphere. Factories for the production of food, plants, mushrooms, insects, microbes, and livestock are located on the level closest to the core.

2:03Earth's biodiversity is traveling with you to the neighboring star system. In order to maintain this biodiversity in natural conditions, engineers have equipped the ship with tropical and boreal forests. Scientists recommend regular visits to these natural areas to reduce anxiety and homesickness. The second level is designed to support passengers' social life. There are parks, schools, libraries, and hospitals here. Community and spending time together should protect you from existential horror and distract you from realizing how far away you are from your home planet. The next level of Chris Salis has an air and heat circulation center. If the core is the heart of the ship, then this area is its lungs. Then there's a layer designed for waste recycling, construction, and numerous factories. There will always be something to do on the ship and you will never be out of work. This means you will never face a financial crisis.

3:04The last and furthest level from the core works as a giant warehouse for storing various resources, materials, equipment, and machines. In order not to burden people with additional work at this layer, engineers placed robots with artificial intelligence here. The ship's complex and multi-layered systems work to provide the passengers with the feeling that they're on Earth. But if you want to remind yourself where you really are, you can go to the front part of Chris Salis, where engineers installed a so-called space dome with a gravity zone. Here you will have a great time with zero gravity, enjoying an incredible panoramic view of space. In order to maintain a stable demographic and not provoke overpopulation of the ship, it's necessary to have at least 1,500 people on board. That's 900 people fewer than the stated capacity. Engineers and pilots responsible for managing the spacecraft will be cooperating with artificial intelligence.

4:07But of course, no comfort makes sense without security. The Chris Salis body has a cylindrical shape with a narrow front, which reduces the risk of impacts from small meteorites and space debris. Mobility, speed, and long flight time are provided by an engine working on a nuclear fusion isotope of helium and deuterium. It gives the ship a simultaneous boost of thrust and electrical power. Now all your attention should be focused on the preservation of the human species. Over the course of 400 years, while the ship travels to its destination, several generations will change. Your kids and future descendants won't get the experience of living on Earth. Skill teachers, engineers, and other professionals, along with artificial intelligence, will teach the next generation science, culture, and all the necessary knowledge that will help build our civilization in a new home. The success of the mission also depends on the psychological state of the passengers.

5:09For this reason, not everyone will be able to access the Chris Salis board. To adapt the human brain to the conditions of terrestrial isolation, the first generations will need to spend approximately 70 to 80 years in a remote area of Antarctica. Obviously, after such a long period, many won't be alive anymore, but they will make their descendants ready for a space mission. The first generation will never see space and will spend their entire lives in the cold Antarctica. What kind of person can be prepared for this? The renunciation of the world and sacrifice for the sake of other people will set an example of the highest manifestation of love. This fact adds more responsibility to your mission. You've just watched the presentation of the Chris Salis project, which won first place at the Project Hyperion Design Competition. A group of specialists has prepared a well-thought-out plan to create a spacecraft capable of taking us to the nearest planet suitable for habitation.

6:15According to estimates, this ship can be built in 20 to 25 years. But first, people need to invent fusion reactors. This project is a practical instruction on how to start the expansion of space or how it can work like Plan B in case a global catastrophe happens on our planet. But what is this planet that has captured the minds of scientists and astronomers? Could it potentially become our new home? Proxima Centauri B is located 4.24 light-years away. It's not easy for the human mind to imagine and realize this distance. But relative to the entire outer space, it's very close to Earth. One light-year is the distance that you travel during one year moving at the speed of light, which is approximately 983 billion feet per second. The distance Crisolus would have to cover is about 25 trillion miles. And the time needed for this journey is about 400 years.

7:17The ship would accelerate during the first year of this long voyage, and it slowed down for the last year of the trip. It'd be a long, risky, and very exciting journey, but the result would be worth it. Proxima Centauri B was discovered in 2016. Its mass is 1.1 times that of Earth, and it orbits its star every 11 days. The distance between the planet and its star is ideal for getting enough light and maintaining temperatures above the freezing point of water. But because of this proximity, there is a possibility that Proxima Centauri B is under a strong influence of gravity and orbits the star with one side. Like the moon orbits Earth. Anyway, the planet immediately attracted everyone's attention, because it turned out to be very similar to Earth in many ways. Scientists used special computer models to study Proxima Centauri B. The same models are used to study the climate of our planet.

8:18They found out there might be huge areas of liquid water in that distant world, and probably living organisms. But if the planet is always facing the sun with one side, there's probably a huge temperature in balance. Fortunately, this problem can be solved. According to new calculations, Proxima Centauri B might have a large circulating ocean that can effectively transfer heat from one side of the exoplanet to the other. A similar process happens on Earth. For example, the east coast of the United States has a milder and warmer climate because the Gulf Stream carries warm water from the tropics there. In California, the ocean current brings cold waters from the north and prevents this side from getting too hot. So maybe Proxima Centauri B is really not a bad option for us. That's it for today. So hey, if you pacified your curiosity, then give the video a like and share it with your friends.

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