During the early 1970s, a team from the British Interplanetary Society carried out the world’s first serious engineering study of an interstellar vehicle – Project Daedalus.


Daedalus was conceived as a two-stage vehicle, which would attain a speed of 12 percent of the speed of light, for a 50-year voyage to reach Barnard’s Star.


Weighing in at 60,000 tons when fully fuelled, Daedalus would dwarf even the Saturn V rocket.


The Daedalus spacecraft’s spherical tanks contain the fuel pellets for the nuclear fusion engine.


Daedalus’ Deuterium/Helium 3 fuel pellets are injected into the engine, where they are hit by electron beams, compressing them to the point that fusion occurs. Magnetic fields contain the expanding plasma.


During Daedalus’ two years of first stage engine firing, empty fuel tanks are jettisoned to reduce weight.


Once all Daedalus’ first stage fuel is consumed, the first stage is jettisoned and the second stage continues to accelerate for another 1.8 years – the vehicle now coasts, unpowered, for the remainder of the 50-year voyage.


Daedalus’ second stage carries radio telescopes, 2 5m optical telescopes, 18 probes, two autonomous spacecraft known as Wardens, computers, power supplies and a Beryllium erosion shield.


Daedalus’ flyby of the target system would be over in a matter of hours, the data being relayed back to Earth, using the engine bell as a parabolic radio antenna.


It was envisaged that the Daedalus starship would be constructed in orbit around the Jovian moon Europa.

Project Icarus is looking again at interstellar spacecraft, in the light of new developments in physics, materials and astronomy. A series of smaller test vehicles is envisaged to test the new technologies.


A potential spacecraft called Icarus Pathfinder would be powered by VASIMR engines, taking it out to 1,000 AU (the distance between the Earth and sun).


Obtaining the exotic fuels needed for interstellar flight is a major challenge – here a scheme is shown where a spacecraft in low orbit around Jupiter lowers an extremely long tube into the atmosphere, sucking up and processing gases.


Another spaceship fuel-mining scheme involves balloon miners in the atmosphere of Uranus, where gases would be collected and processed, and then carried to the fuelling site by smaller tanker spacecraft.


Project Icarus is currently at a very early stage and no definitive design has been selected – this illustration shows one possible candidate concept for an interstellar spacecraft.


This Icarus concept starship uses Graphene as a shield material to protect the vehicle during the voyage to another star.


Future starships may be constructed in Earth orbit using a ring-type construction facility, which could have hotel rooms where guests could observe the construction.

As per quantum mechanics, vacuum of space has bursting particles and antiparticles that appears and vanishes. VARIES propels by harvesting the antiparticles before they collide with particles and use them to generate an electric field with help of a laser system.


The laser to be used here requires a very high intensity and it depends on future developments in laser technology. The images show the spaceship's laser system in operation as it feeds the antimatter particles to the apparatus.


VARIES starship need to be designed to recharge itself when it travels near a star. With a large array of solar panels, it is possible to generate enough power for its laser system.