Adam Hibberd November 2022 In my last blog I reported the progress of my work regarding the intriguing little conundrum of the first interstellar object (ISO) to be discovered, designated ‘Oumuamua, in particular my research into its orbit. In fact ‘Oumuamua is puzzling on many counts and I have also in a previous blog elaborated […]
News from the Initiative for Interstellar Studies
In this section you can read some of the latest news from i4is and the world of interstellar studies. If you know of appropriate news please get in touch and it might appear here.
Exploring ‘Oumuamua’s Perihelion Date
Adam Hibberd October 2022 This blog may be a bit cheeky but do take heed of the last line before jumping to any conclusions! I’ve been mucking around with ‘Oumuamua’s orbit on my computer lately. Mucking around in the sense of playing with its orbital parameters and seeing what crops up. Those of you who […]
Sailing to Apophis
Adam Hibberd September 2022 Of the existential threats posed by celestial objects to our Earth, the cradle of humanity and currently our only life-support, there are myriad such candidates. In fact we are in a veritable astronomical mine-field, the key question is not if but when. Take comets for instance. These objects composed primarily of […]
Skateboards to Starships
The third i4is summer workshops at the Royal Institution We were first invited to deliver a one day summer workshop for school students by the Royal Institution {RIGB, www.rigb.org) in 2018. We called it “Skateboards to Starships” to show that the basic physics, maths and engineering principles applied to both and at many scales between.We […]
Summer Course 25-29th July 2022
Latest News: Special guest panel with Brian ‘BK’ Kelly, former Director Flight Operations NASA and ‘Ray J’ Johnson pilot of final Shuttle mission to Hubble Space Telescope.
The Limitless Space Institute commissioned the Initiative for Interstellar Studies to create a course to educate and inspire the next generation to explore and travel beyond our solar system. Following on from the inaugural class in 2021 this second class also incorporates material previously delivered to the International Space University and i4is’ own ‘Starship Engineer’ courses.
Project Lyra: Presentation at SunDiver Workshop in Luxembourg
On the 17-18th of May, a workshop on “Fast, Low-Cost, Interplanetary Sailcraft Science Missions” took place in the Neimenster Abbey in Luxembourg, organized by the University of Luxembourg (SnT), Breakthrough Initiatives, and NASA-JPL. Our Executive Director Andreas Hein organized this meeting in his capacity as a professor of space systems engineering at the University of […]
i4is Featured in Science & Vie
Our Executive Director, Andreas Hein, has been featured in the special edition of Science & Vie, one of the major French science outlets. The article covers the topic of asteroid mining.
i4is Venus Balloon Mission on Bloomberg!
Our Venus balloon paper has been featured in Bloomberg Moon Shots. Our Executive Director Andreas Hein, who is also the main author of the study presents our mission study, together with MIT’s Sara Seager. Hein, A. M., Lingam, M., Eubanks, T. M., Hibberd, A., Fries, D., & Blase, W. P. (2020). A precursor Balloon mission […]
Project Lyra Page Update
We have updated our Project Lyra page, taking our most recent publications and media coverage into account. We have also added an FAQ that addresses the most frequently asked questions about our project. Please have a look and enjoy!
Project Lyra on Newsweek!
We are proud to report that Project Lyra has been featured in Newsweek and other major media outlets, thanks to the recent paper “Project Lyra: A Mission to 1I/’Oumuamua without Solar Oberth Manoeuvre”.
Project Lyra on Youtube!
Another i4is Youtube video, this time an introduction to Project Lyra. The ‘Oumuamua mystery is still not solved: What is ‘Oumuamua? The only way to find out is to fly there. But is that possible? This video answers this question. Error correction: The Earth travels at about 26 km/s with respect to other surrounding stars, […]
World Ships on Youtube!
i4is’ Andreas Hein has created a short Youtube video to introduce world ships, focusing on the 1984 Bond & Martin designs. Short introduction to “world ships”, possibly the largest interstellar vessels ever designed. They have been proposed by Alan Bond and Anthony Martin in 1984. They are hundreds of kilometres long, house a population the […]