An exo-tourist's guide to our closest alien planet

Now that we know our nearest neighbouring star system, Alpha Centauri, contains at least one planet, it's time to go exo-tourist and plan a trip. But be sure to read our travel guide first.

How long will it take to reach the new planet?
Alpha Centauri is roughly 4.3 light years away. Given current technology, getting there would take a minimum of 19,000 years ? if you clip along at the top speed ever achieved by a spacecraft, the Helios-2 solar probe.

Oh. Is the journey likely to speed up any time soon?
No, although Wired has jokingly called on space entrepreneur Elon Musk, founder of the company SpaceX, to get involved now that we know Alpha Centauri has a planet.

If Musk did take up the challenge, he wouldn't be the first to do so. In 1968, physicist Freeman Dyson suggested sending his proposed Project Orion spacecraft to the star system. He envisioned it as being powered by the shockwaves from a series of nuclear explosions. Travelling at just over 3 per cent of the speed of light, it would have required 300,000 1-megaton bombs and taken just 133 years to reach its destination ? all for a cost equal to just 10 per cent of US GDP.

And if Musk isn't interested, perhaps it would be worth going down the crowdfunding route.

Assuming I can buy a ticket there, exactly which destination should I be asking for?
Exoplanets normally inherit the name of their parent star, with the first planet discovered in a system labelled "b", the next "c" and so on. That's all very well, but Alpha Centauri is a binary star. The new planet orbits Alpha Centauri B, the smaller of the two stars, making its official name the slightly awkward Alpha Centauri B b.

Can't we think of a better name?
Fictional Alpha Centauri planets have already been named multiple times ? the system is a popular sci-fi stepping-stone to the galaxy ? though these planets more often orbit the larger star of the pair. In his Foundation series, Isaac Asimov bestowed the simple name Alpha upon a world orbiting Alpha Centauri A; Arthur C. Clarke dubbed his world Pasadena in The Songs of Distant Earth. The film Avatar is set on Pandora, a moon orbiting the gas giant Polyphemus around Alpha Centauri A, while players of the video game Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri are challenged to colonise a fictional planet called Chiron. Perhaps you could use some of the flight time to think of something even better.

What is the scope like for sightseeing?
Limited, given that you would probably die if you tried to set foot on the planet without some serious heat-proofing. The planet's surface is roasting hot and is probably molten lava, according Xavier Dumusque of the University of Geneva in Switzerland, who led the team that discovered the planet. What's more, we do not yet know if this world has an atmosphere. All this means the planet itself is extremely unlikely to harbour life ? although its neighbours might.

Wait? there might be more planets?
Though only one planet in the star system has been detected so far, planets are seldom loners. If the newly spotted planet has siblings, these may be rocky ? like Alpha Centauri B b. And if they are sitting further from the star, they would be better potential hosts for alien life.

Seth Shostak of the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California, told the Washington Post that astronomers had scanned Alpha Centauri in the 90s for unusual radio waves in space that might be produced by intelligent beings. But the SETI (Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence) project may now scan "across a broader range of radio channels in case other, more habitable planets also lurk in the system", he added.

Could I stargaze once I'm there?
Assuming you could somehow survive on the planet ? or at least hover in orbit ? the night sky wouldn't look all that different from Earth's, since the planet is so close to us. The biggest difference would be in the constellation Cassiopeia. When viewed from Earth, this looks like five stars in a W shape, but as the Centauri Dreams blog points out, it would acquire a sixth when viewed from the new planet ? our own Sun.

Is there anything else to do?
Well, if you are feeling homesick and you have brought along an extremely sensitive antenna, you might just be able to tune into Earth TV ? but it would all be repeats. Radio and TV broadcasts travel away from Earth at the speed of light, so right now Alpha Centauri is only just picking up transmissions from roughly four years and four months ago. That means any inhabitants of the star system are now watching the season four finale of Lost and are in the middle of the Tenth Doctor's run in Doctor Who. In a few months, they willbe able to watch Barack Obama get elected US president ? for the first time, that is.

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