The REAL Possibility of Mapping Alien Planets!

This video is from the "PBS Space Time" channel on YouTube and discusses an unusual proposal for an astronomical mission that is likely to happen. The proposal involves using a train of spacecraft that travel to a magical point in space using sunlight, where the Sun's gravity turns it into a massive lens. This solar system-sized telescope can see almost anything and will definitely be able to map the surfaces of alien planets. The video also refers to the Kepler mission, which has shown that there are billions of exoplanets in our galaxy. The James Webb Space Telescope can detect different molecules in the atmospheres of planets slightly larger than Earth and even take images of some exoplanets. However, these images will never show more than a single point in orbit around a star. If we find evidence of life, we will want to study it in more detail, ideally with images of the planetary surface. To see the surfaces of exoplanets as more than a point, we would need a telescope much larger than New York City. But there is a way to take a direct image of an exoplanet in visible light that could reveal its surface details, and that is by sending a spacecraft. Not towards the planet, but in the opposite direction. If you travel directly along the line connecting your favorite exoplanet and the Sun, you will reach this point where the light rays from the planet are bent inwards by the Sun's gravitational field to all come together. At this point, we have a star-sized telescope. The result is an amplification of the brightness of the exoplanet by a trillion times, and a magnification of the surface details by a hundred billion times. The video also addresses the challenges and technologies needed to reach this point and carry out this mission, including the use of solar sails for space travel and advanced techniques for navigating and maneuvering spacecraft. Finally, the video shows how we can use existing or developing technologies to map the surfaces of distant planets in great detail and perhaps even discover signs of advanced civilizations.