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VARIES: The Fastest Starship to Proxima Centauri?

The problem with space is that it’s big. Really, really big. To get to the nearest planet in our solar system takes months at best. But say if you wanted to travel to the nearest star?

This question is currently being considered by a team of scientists and engineers from Icarus Interstellar Inc., one of a group of organizations chosen to spearhead DARPA’s 100 Year Star Ship (100YSS) project.

The aim of 100YSS is to formulate plans to send humans to in interstellar destination — such as Proxima Centauri, a little over 4 light-years from Earth — within the next century.

But Richard Obousy, President and Co-Founder of Icarus Interstellar, introduced the Vacuum to Antimatter-Rocket Interstellar Explorer System (VARIES) — an unmanned prototype starship — to Discovery News readers on Monday as one of the projects Icarus is working on to make our interstellar dreams come true.

With the help of the stunning artwork by Adrian Mann, take a look at how this futuristic technology may be able to unlock antimatter from the vacuum of space and use it to propel the ultimate interstellar spaceship.

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