We've never had an Apollo, Space Shuttle, or ISS size robotic exploration program and I don't think people realize the insane stuff we could do at those scales if we weren't hung up on filling these things with primates.
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If you want to get to 500 AU and come to a relative stop when you get there, you're going to need the very biggest of launch vehicles currently only being pushed by the crewed space programs.
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You'll definitely need orbital refueling, being driven by moon/mars crewed projects. This is the problem with focusing on robotic exploration, it devolves to small thinking. Launching people needs to be easy because it expands the possibility for exploration.
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Voyager 1 is only at 154 AU right now. How long would it take to get such a satellite out to 500 AU? If we had one that far out, it would take about a week to send commands and receive responses.
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It's not easy! It would require about the same level of breakthrough R&D and applied engineering as a Mars mission, except applied to space stuff instead of keeping primates alive in a radiation box.
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But why do we want to image exoplanets?
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