This is a pretty cool initiative — I looked into beamed propulsion a bit while teaching a course this past fall, and it seems to me that if we (or human technologies) are going to reach a star in our lifetimes, this is by far the most likely way. Still very challenging though.
To poll the success of this overall endeavor, as well as start to make predictions about which components will/won’t work, [Metaculus](http://www.metaculus.com/questions/#/?order_by=-publish_time) is launching a series of questions —check it out if you have expertise or opinion.
This is a pretty cool initiative — I looked into beamed propulsion a bit while teaching a course this past fall, and it seems to me that if we (or human technologies) are going to reach a star in our lifetimes, this is by far the most likely way. Still very challenging though.
For a quite detailed recent treatment of optical/IR propulsion see: [this paper by Philip Lubin](http://www.deepspace.ucsb.edu/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/A-R...)
For a thorough, if somewhat outdated, treatment of the [“starwisp”](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starwisp) idea using microwaves rather than optical/IR lasers, see [this paper](http://path-2.narod.ru/design/base_e/starwisp.pdf) by Robert Forward.
To poll the success of this overall endeavor, as well as start to make predictions about which components will/won’t work, [Metaculus](http://www.metaculus.com/questions/#/?order_by=-publish_time) is launching a series of questions —check it out if you have expertise or opinion.