The evolution of insect swarms from XNUMX million years ago

Chapter 221 Heading to the Asteroid Belt
On the surface of Mars, a large number of biological electromagnetic gun structures are erected into the sky, using special cannonballs to transport large amounts of concentrated nutrients into space.

A huge pupal sac structure gradually took shape, and from time to time, cannonballs trailed through the thin atmosphere of Mars, entered space, changed their orbits, entered the pupal sac structure through the special opening structure, dissolved themselves, and became part of the space creatures.

In his imagination, this carrot-shaped space creature is just a transitional product, suitable for navigation between star systems. Therefore, Lin Yi does not plan to give them detailed names for the time being, but simply distinguish them by numbers.

Lin Yi's ultimate goal is to conduct interstellar navigation and leave the solar system for development. However, to achieve this goal, at least a nuclear fusion reactor and a supporting propulsion system are needed. The realization of controllable nuclear fusion is not yet in sight.

However, Lin Yi believes that this is only a matter of time. At present, with the existence of space creatures, many previously unexplored inner planets can be explored and even colonized with the endurance of nuclear rocket engines.

But for now, Lin Yi has no plans to colonize Jupiter and planets beyond. At present, his focus is still on continuing archeology - the remains of Bao on Mars have been excavated. The next step is to The fifth planet is now the asteroid belt.

At the level of traditional chemical energy rockets previously launched from the earth, flying to the asteroid belt is quite time-consuming and laborious, and the payload is very small. Most of the mass will be fuel and oxidizer, that is, the propulsion medium.

Even if launched from Mars, the situation will not be much better. Therefore, space creatures equipped with nuclear rocket thrusters will become the core of the next operation.

There is no special carrying space in the body of the space creature, and its transportation is based on a special additional capsule structure. Since there is no need to consider resistance and other issues in space, the strong thrust brought by the four nuclear rocket engines of the space creature is enough. It carries an extremely large carrying compartment.

The overall carrier capsule is in the shape of a sac, with a mass reaching nearly half of that of space creatures. It is hung under the body of space creatures by a special structure, and the interior is filled with a large amount of concentrated nutrients separated by diaphragms and valve structures.

To be precise, inside each compartment is an airdrop structure that can independently land on the surface of the planet. The nutrients contained inside are enough to turn into a small mother nest.

Of course, this set of structures was developed for large-scale landings on other terrestrial planets in the future. If it is just the development of the asteroid belt, there is no need for so many airdrop structures.

However, the first carrier structure began to be produced with the pupation of the first space creature, and was ready to be put into use at the same time after the production of the space creature was completed.

after a while.

With the continuous supply of nutrients from Mars, the first space creature quickly completed pupation. Under the action of multiple layers of melanin, its huge body showed an obvious dark brown color, temporarily covering up its appearance like a carrot. The abstract shape brought by the shape.

The reactor fuel and propulsion medium have been filled. At this time, several large plate-like structures on the "Carrot", shaped like paddling feet, rotate and adjust their direction, and the astonishingly huge body slowly moves forward.

If you switch the observation method to the infrared thermal imaging perspective at this time, you will find that the temperature at the tail nozzle of the space creature is rising sharply, leaving an obvious scorching trail in the cold universe. It is the propellant that has been heated to a high temperature and is ejected, emitting dazzling thermal radiation in space close to absolute zero. From the detection perspective of the infrared band, it is as conspicuous as a bright light in the dark night. With current technical means, This is probably inevitable.

In the early days of the space age, if there was a space war, passive observation of the high-temperature wake of the spacecraft through the infrared band might be a very practical detection method, which was very obvious and impossible to hide.

Propulsion using non-high-temperature working fluids cannot propel large spacecraft very well. Even more advanced deuterium rocket engines based on nuclear fusion rather than nuclear fission are propelled by injecting high-temperature working fluids. Therefore, even if there are more advanced propulsion methods, there is nothing to hide from the large infrared detection structure.
Therefore, the infrared sensing compound eyes that were canceled during the development of Shadowflies because they were ineffective in the Paleozoic environment full of ectothermic animals were further modified by Lin Yi and converted into a large infrared detection structure installed on space creatures. .

Although at present, Lin Yi himself is the only one in the solar system who can actively carry out interplanetary navigation, and this system cannot be used in theory, but just in case, Lin Yi installed a large infrared sensing system in On space creatures, it is turned on for a long time.

In the same way, large biological optical telescopes composed of specially structured compound eyes and radar systems that can emit and receive electromagnetic waves are also installed throughout the bodies of space creatures, becoming the eyes and ears of space creatures.

Among them, the detection of optical and infrared bands has high concealment because it is passively received and does not send out active signals. The active radar is more useful for detecting meteorites and other obstacles on the track ahead, rather than searching for enemies.

Since the interior of the solar system is a safe area for the time being, Lin Yi can safely turn on the active radar to detect the situation ahead.

The nuclear rocket engine of the space creature is running, starting from the orbit of Mars and sailing all the way to the outer circle of the solar system, heading to the former fifth planet, where the asteroid belt is now.

Although the asteroid belt is a belt-like area with dense asteroids, on a vast cosmic scale, the asteroid belt is relatively dense and not as dense as imagined.

The theory of its origin in later generations is that the asteroid belt was formed in the early stages of the formation of the solar system when Jupiter's gravitational interference caused a large amount of material to not aggregate into planets. It is considered to be some kind of residual material from the formation of the solar system.

But the current situation shows that there once was a fifth planet in the solar system, but unknown intervenors used the same unknown means to smash it into pieces, forming the current asteroid belt.

Lin Yi's main purpose of going to the asteroid belt was still archeology and detecting the traces left by Bao, but it was not the only purpose.

For various reasons, he does not intend to colonize the outer planets for the time being, but this does not mean that he intends to stop external exploration. As for the method of continuing external exploration, it is just right to implement it in the asteroid belt. .

(End of this chapter)