Is it possible to move the solar system?

Is it possible to build a stellar engine -a giant device to move our solar system, if for some reason we have to move to another region of the universe? Such an unusual question was asked by astrophysicist Matthew Kaplan of the University of Illinois, the author of a scientific article published in the journal Acta Astronautica. Kaplan's unique and semi-fantastic engine is able to use the energy of the Sun to move a star through the galaxy and even its limits. Is it possible to create a Kaplan engine in real life, and if so, in what way can it be able to move the solar system?

Is it possible to move the solar system using the Kaplan engine?

Is it possible to move the sun?

Earth is incredibly lucky to be in the placewhere it is - for an incredible combination of circumstances, our solar system is located in a relatively calm area of ​​the Milky Way, where it is rare to find dangerous flashes of gamma radiation, where supernovae rarely explode and there are no particularly large black holes. However, as you know, the Universe is constantly changing, and what seemed stable and safe today suddenly is in danger of colliding with a massive asteroid, comet rainfall or the consequence of a supernova explosion.

According to the portal sciencealert.com, the Kaplan engine will have to be located in relative proximity to the Sun in order to be able to use the solar wind to collect hydrogen and helium, which will be used as a practically inexhaustible fuel.

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Kaplan’s engine, using the energy of the solar wind, will be able to move the solar system over vast distances.

The use of solar wind would result inthe action is two jets of energy, one of which would work on helium, and the second on hydrogen. Interacting with each other inside a thermonuclear reactor, the formed powerful jets would move the device forward, acting as a kind of tug.

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Since the presence of only the solar wind does notcover all the necessary fuel costs, scientists of the future will need to create some kind of Dyson sphere, which would concentrate sunlight to even better generate the energy needed to build a colossal structure. As the Sun shifts, the planets of our stellar system would move behind it without any disturbance in their orbits, so that humanity would not need to move the objects of the Solar system separately.

However, it is worth noting that the idea ofThe movement of the solar system is no longer new and was proposed for the first time by the Soviet scientist Leonid Mikhailovich Shkadov, who in his work explored the possibility of creating a super-powerful engine, with which we could move the solar system 100 light-years over 230 million years. Be that as it may, the engine proposed by Matthew Kaplan could cover the same distance in just 2 million years.

It is not known whether our descendants will desireand the need to change the location of the Sun and its surrounding planets. In your opinion, do humanity need to deal with such grandiose projects and for what? Share your opinion in our Telegram chat.