Cruise | Interplanetary dust
Since the trajectory to Alpha Centauri would take the nanocrafts away from the ecliptic plane of the solar system, there would be much less impact from solar system dust than from interstellar dust.
Little is currently known about the dust content in the Alpha Centauri star system.
Mar 26, 2021 20:07
Breakthrough Initiatives
Posted on: Breakthrough Initiatives
Our first goal is to reach the nearest stars and not contemplate farther destinations like the Galactic center, because we will not live to see such longer-distance missions come to fruition.
Indeed, perturbations from stars and the Galactic tide should be included in the trajectory calculation. The gravitational influence of solar system planets like Jupiter should also be included, but asteroids and smaller objects have a negligible gravitational effect. Electromagnetic deflections are small and discussed in
https://arxiv.org/pdf/1706.07798.pdf
Thank you for offering your insightful comments.
-- Avi Loeb, Professor of Science, Harvard University
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