Roses and baobabs

I am writing a fantastic story. The action begins in the near future and ends in billions of years. Many events, some realistic, part full HEX. At the same time, there is a desire to do everything more firmly so that magic does not rush into the eyes and pianos do not climb from all the cracks. Labor is much more than what remains in the text. Technology and concepts. Invented looking for confirmation in the real world. If I find, I am glad, I am even more happy if I do not find it. Although it can only talk about the quality of my search.

For the volumes of interplanetary transportation in my history, all the oil of the Earth, fired on kerosene, is not enough for a month. I thought about launching into space from a gravitational well of our planet cargoes without missiles. I came up with a long, hard and big. I liked the idea myself. Once, when I once again climbed into the Internet to inquire about something and went further than usual to Wikipedia links, I came across a detailed description of this construction. Well, everything is thought up to us.

However. Some time ago, Breakthrough Starshot was announced. The idea itself, it seems to me something ordinary. Fly and take a picture. In my humble opinion, such devices are capable of much more. In my story there is a similar concept of the key technology of the future - film - solar sail - space probe. I hope to surprise with something from this concept.

The film is a highly modified solar sail. It consists of typical elements and can be divided and assembled along their borders. Several films can form one large and crumble into a million fragments.
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If an ordinary solar sail is an excellent, durable, weightless mirror, uncontrolled without external influence, then the film can turn itself and lock into space without additional elements: jet engines, cables, a skeleton or gyros. In reality, these additions will find their application. But they are denied for the sake of the grace of the concept. The design of the film can be folded into any complex origami and without them. It provides blinds.



1. Blinds closed. The film works as a reflector. Light presses on the film, it moves from the light source.
2. The film opens the blinds and becomes transparent. The light no longer holds it and it falls under the influence of gravity.
3. One half of the film is transparent, the other reflector. The transparent part of the falls, the reflective balances gravity by the pressure of light - the film is folded.

By adjusting these two states and carving itself out, the film controls its shape and movement. You can fold a corner reflector, giant hyperboloid of engineer Garin, a screen to create twilight on Mercury, a fan, a sling - a huge assortment of space tools of a star engineer.

Spaceship. Easily. Film as a body. Put two films on top of each other, catch a load between it. The starship is ready. You can even fly to the Andromeda Galaxy. For a long time, really. But if you take a lot of films, the process will accelerate significantly.



From the stream of small films gather large - petals. In my story - first three film fragments in the corners of an equilateral triangle. Initially, they rotate around the sun, like ordinary satellites. As they grow, more and more sunlight is tied into their triangle. When a certain size of the stream of captured light is reached, they will be statically hanging only due to the intensity of the light, balancing gravity. There is an excess of energy that is spent on the processing of Mercury on the new petals. It is easier to concentrate energy on it. Fragments fill the whole sky. The whole sky of the sun. Rose blossomed.

Technically, this is a type II civilization according to Kardyshev’s classification. Dyson Sphere for the poor. The films redistribute all the energy of the body. For settlement, as in the original idea, the design is not suitable. And it's too early to travel. But for star engineering and construction of interstellar highways is more than enough.

Normal ships with a solar sail can be dispersed. Energy we have the whole Sun. But if they do not smear on some grains of sand, I still can’t imagine how to brake them inexpensively. Three hundred years to the nearest star, it's still long. Alternative - Corium ships. But the generation of the gloomy genius is the stellar transport "Chernobyl", not for the story, about the delicate Roses. Although worthy of mention. If in reality the creation of precision nanofilms is impossible technologically, then there is a more clumsy option in the reserve, to the "joy" of environmentalists.
We concentrate the light in one direction and launch a stream of films there.

Encounters with dust and grains are experiencing construction without much damage. She has no central nodes. Damage can not be critical. The blinds are open and most of the dust passes through them without touching the film.

In case of an accident, the film is able to repair itself. After the hole is formed, the film separates a piece at its edge, forming two independent films. They maneuver, relative to each other, until the patch closes the hole and connects with the main film. The main thing is to have enough light. And if not enough, the loss of part of the films makes the journey just more expensive.

On the other hand, objects in interstellar space move rather slowly. The speed goes on meters-centimeters. Due to the energy of Roses' light, you can break through a wide tunnel, by evaporating dust and ice from a neighboring star, marking stones and grains of sand. Films will get to the goal in better safety.

Anyway, our films have reached the edge of another star, it's time to slow down.



A large film reflects light to a smaller one, and that one is already concentrating it on a film that is inhibited. Film hubs overtake and fly forward. Their place is taken up following from the stream. The masses on braking still need a lot. I do not mind the whole Mercury let the wind down. Let it run swift.

The ultimate goal is to deliver to just one colonization package. Ideally, one film is enough to carry extra weight. In my story - this is a seed.

Star orbit reached. The first target is a Ceretoid type planetoid. There are supposedly both water ice and hydrocarbons and it is located relatively close to the star.



The film fixes itself at the Lagrange point 2. The planetoid surface is studied, a suitable point is selected. It concentrates stellar rays, causing melting and explosion. After the surface hardens, a fresh, smooth crater forms, without bumps and sharp rocks. In case of failure, you can try again.

The film cuts itself, cutting out the part that fell into the shadow of the planetoid. There is no light in the shadows, and only gravity acts. Parts of the film in the shade are more difficult to stabilize themselves, so this mass is worth getting rid of. There is a ring in the sky that will work as a starlight hub. The cut part falls on the surface of the dwarf planet in the prepared crater.

With a runaway speed of 200-300 meters and a flat surface, the blow will not destroy the film structure. This is nothing special even for modern materials. If a more gentle landing is required, the film-ring can concentrate light and melt the surface of the planetoid, triggering the eruption of dust and gases that will soften the fall.

On Ceres, some storyline events are connected with fountain transport. In the mine, rock is mined, which the centrifugal cannon throws toward the processing plant. Without the atmosphere and with low gravity, the rock flies a thousand kilometers in the form of a stream of rubble and falls into the funnel of the separation plant.

Here it happens less elegant, but more spectacular. Heavenly ring burns out the guide channels. It blows up the ground so that the directed eruption of ice and minerals takes place and their impact on the film in the crater.
Upon reaching a sufficient amount of matter, the celestial film cuts off another part of itself. A new piece falls and covers the crater with another layer. The films are glued together, sealing the internal cavity. It turned out the bag. It reflects the light of the reflector. The ice between the two films is heated, a reservoir is created. A simple aquarium. Living conditions are created.

Activated seed. It receives light from the star and the reflector, consumes minerals from the environment for growth. It grows, turning into a huge tree-baobab plant for the production of film, seeds and any future that is useful for people. The newly produced film is launched into the sky, creating the petals of a new rose and capturing other planetoids. Baobabs tear apart asteroids. More films fly into space. Chain reaction. Around the star blooms a new rose.

The films are gray goo, von Neumann's automata. Earthlings have not yet had time to properly deal with the solar system, as the nearest stars will be colonized. Conditions have been created for braking ordinary ships on a solar sail, and interstellar flight will become commonplace.



A wave of galactic colonization will begin. If we take the speed of propagation of films to the tenth speed of light, then just a couple of millions of years will be enough for the Roses to bloom throughout the Milky Way near each star. Another 25 million and the Andromeda Galaxy will become a flower garden. This is less than 0.2 percent of the entire history of the universe.

But if you look at the sky then there are no Dyson spheres, no stars bloom is observed.

And this is good. With the advent of super-films technology, the achievement of type III according to Kardyshev is only a matter of time and speed of light. After starting the process of colonization of stars by automata, civilization itself is not needed to continue it. What is within the same system, that within the universe. It turns out that the minimum requirements for civilization even of the V type - the use of all the energy of the Universe does not differ qualitatively from the requirements for Type II. The interval from a primitive civilization to the thunderstorm of the universe is only a couple of hundred years. From a timid radio signal to a wave of subluminal spacecraft.

Stupid robots will execute the program. A program that, when meeting with another civilization, will inevitably lead to the disappearance of the weakest civilization.

Expansion will take place expanding in all directions sphere. A film with baobab seed after acceleration flies equally to the nearest star or galaxy at the other end of the universe. Amount? If you disassemble Mercury into films, how many packages of films with seeds for an interstellar flight will be? Hundreds of trillions no longer seems like a huge number. There may be a limitation in the capabilities of the sun. But there is Sirius with its huge luminosity nearby and it can be used as the basis for the Rose of great expansion. Therefore, for a hundred years, sending gifts to one hundred trillion stars is not a problem.



This figure shows that equilibrium in the spherical-equestrian case is possible if there was a simultaneous start of expansion. The border goes along the intersection of the circles indicating the front of the expansion of the automata. The greater the difference in the beginning, the less space is available to the pioneers of latecomers. The border of busy stars is getting closer. Less space - less resource base - less energy per acceleration - lower propagation velocity. A large civilization will put more energy into acceleration and more films at braking. Sooner or later, the late will be surrounded, and his expansion will stop. And if the wave of colonization has passed, then the late civilization has no possibility at all to get to the stars in the universe of alien Roses.

Now they talk a lot about KIC 8462852 Tabby star. A star - with the light of which something strange is happening. Its brightness changes without any order, astronomers are confused.

Suppose that these are indeed the actions of civilization and now they are engaged in the arrangement of their system. The apparent decrease in the brightness of the star - 22% is a lot. Sending films or similar devices will take crumbs of this energy. If the speed of light for them is still the limit, over the past one and a half millennia the sphere of their influence, created by the automata of this civilization, can be quite close to the solar system. If we take the scenario of reaching 95% of the speed of light, the time for acceleration and deceleration, then the sphere radius can be more than 1350 light years. And people have only a hundred years to do something about this.

Fly one such film into the solar system today, all we can do is watch it powerless. Without the Little Prince writhing deadly baobabs, large asteroids will be dismantled. A huge mirror of films will appear near the Earth. In case of refusal from the conditions of unconditional surrender put forward by others, nothing can prevent the fascinating game of magnifying glass and people in the role of ants.

Conclusion: the silence of the cosmos is beautiful.

And just in case an urgent need to seize the universe.