"NASA's Ambitious 2024 Mission: Swarm Proxima Centauri with Tiny Probes and Far-Out Space Tech"

NASA has selected a proposal called Swarming Proxima Centauri, which involves using gram-scale spacecraft propelled by a 100-gigawatt laser beamer to reach Proxima Centauri and its Earth-like exoplanet by the third quarter of this century. The concept, developed by Space Initiatives Inc. and the Initiative for Interstellar Studies, aims to overcome the challenges of interstellar travel by utilizing swarm dynamics and autonomous navigation. The mission could have applications in space exploration, Earth observation, and various fields on Earth, but the primary obstacle remains the cost of the laser array.