Hello Tweeps, it's #scicomm time! In this thread, I will be talking about Dyson spheres- In particular their origin, how they work, their possible (?) existence and their representation in popular science. So let's begin! (1/24)

To begin with, Dyson spheres are hypothetical mega structures which encircle a star and harness it's energy, resulting in the harvest of a significant fraction of power output from it. Think of it as a shell completely encasing a star, say our own sun! (2/24)

The term "Dyson Sphere" was coined by Freeman Dyson, an English-American theoretical physicist best known for his contribution in solid-state physics, astronomy and quantum electrodynamics. (3/24)

He was the recipient of many prestigious awards in academia, including the Max Planck medal, Templeton medal, Gold medal of Royal astronomical society, Henry Poincare prize, Loren medal among others (4/24)

In 1960, he speculated that a "technologically advanced race" (a billion times more civilized than us) could reach the epitome of civilization by exploiting their cosmic nearby star for it's energy needs. Call it an artificial biosphere of the extremes. (5/24)

Now, if one thinks of Dyson spheres, it comes off as a rather far fetched idea but the real question is: could they be plausible? If so, how? And will it help us become a more advanced civilization? (6/24)

According to the Kardashev scale aka the scale dictating the level of advanced civilizations, the ability to consume the energy of a nearby star bumps up a civilization to the type II scale. (sorry humans, we're a type 0 as of now :/ ) (7/24)

More about the Kardashev scale: the term was coined by Russian Astrophysicist Nicolai Kardashev and has 5 levels of civilizations. Type 0 aka Subglobal culture can only extract energy from raw organic material and has so limited travel that it seldom leaves its home planet (8/24)

Type I aka Planetary culture is slightly more advanced that the last one, fully capable of exploiting all resources on their home planet (energy upto 10^15 watts) and basically turn their planet into dust. pls don't let your grandkids see that (9/24)

Type II aka Stellar culture is where a civilization can harness their energy from a local/home star (in our case, 10^26 watts) and would look like all a scene from Star Trek

Type III aka galactic culture is where a civilization will harness the energy output a billion times more than that of a type II. they will travel interstellar distances as easily as you and I hop on a quick bus ride. (11/24)

Type IV will be a universal culture spanning the length and breadth of the cosmos with ease and will have the capacity to alter space and time. pretty scary huh? they might even learn living on the event horizons of the black holes. (12/24)

And last but not least, type V aka Multiverse culture whose members will be fully capable of universal scale manipulation- jumping between multiverses the way we jump across small puddles, easy stuff. overlord of the universe stuff. (13/24)

Whew haha now say a group of aliens want to take over it's neighboring planets or even their local stellar neighborhood. For that, they'll need lots of energy & that will be provided by Dyson spheres. They'll have to build structures & radius twice the Earth-Sun distance. (14/24)

They would also need a plethora of materials and not just any material. A material that is tough, durable, of comfortable thickness and stable enough to not fall into Sun's gravitational pull. The amount of material? Unimaginable. For us? Don't sweat it kiddo. (15/24)

One requirement will also be that the material be capable to conduct proper radiation or else it would melt away. To an observer the sphere will burn bright red in infrared wavelength and be pitch dark otherwise. (16/24)

Also a Dyson sphere has to be devoid of any imperfections aka any bumps because even a tiny bump will make the structure unstable and cause it to cave into the sun. Bye-bye unimaginably expensive device. (17/24)

Now the question is, can we create Dyson spheres for ourselves? The answer is no. But fret not, what we are remotely capable of is to create a Dyson swarm aka thousands of small mirrors encircling our sun- with the panels partially shrouding it. (18/24)

So how to build it? Well, it'll take decades to build it, for starters. The material will be salvaged from Earth in addition to the Oxygen and Iron to be pillaged by robotic diggers from Mercury, Venus, Mars. Basically, entire inner solar system reduced to nothing (19/24)

In addition to that a global cooperation will be necessary to build this. For the question of human settlement, the famous O'Neill Cylinders will house humans a comfortable distance from the sun with the Dyson swarm energy keeping them up and running. (20/24)

Then again, this is a really advanced and futuristic planning requiring world coordination, advanced technology, additional material from other planets- something out of our reach at the moment. It'll take centuries for this to become a reality even if we begin today. (21/24)

Dyson spheres have also found their way into popular culture, famously in Star Trek: The next generation where the starship Enterprise discovers a distress call emanating from a nearby Dyson sphere. Futuristic representation done right! (22/24)

Now I know how disheartening it is to know that we aren't a type I civilization yet and not even remotely capable to build these structures but in order to climb the rungs of the Kardashev scale, we need a huge investment in science, education and world peace. (23/24)

Because that's the only way humanity can achieve something really great. And who knows? If we're smart workers and lucky to survive major catastrophes, modify ourselves and work together, we just might give the next millennia a Dyson swarm! (24/24)

Plugging in @solarrsystem aka the ever awesome Joalda's thread on O'Neill Cylinders for the ones who want to know more about them! https://twitter.com/solarrsystem/status/1275214154090123266?s=20