Overview

• The proposal by astrophysicist Cosimo Bambi appears in iScience as of August 7 and outlines sending a gram-scale “nanocraft” to a black hole 20–25 light-years from Earth.
• The nanocraft would weigh a few grams, carry a microchip and light sail, and be accelerated to roughly one-third of light speed by powerful ground-based lasers.
• At that velocity, the probe could reach its target in about 70 years and transmit data back over the following two decades, resulting in an 80–100 year mission.
• Key technical hurdles include locating a nearby black hole through its gravitational effects, engineering durable miniaturized probes and building a high-power laser array currently estimated at €1 trillion.
• Bambi expects costs to fall toward €1 billion within a few decades, and active efforts are under way to survey the local stellar neighborhood and advance laser-propulsion technologies.