A bold new proposal envisions launching laser-propelled nanocraft to a nearby black hole to test Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity.

It sounds like science fiction: a spacecraft, no heavier than a paperclip, propelled by a laser beam and hurtling through space at the speed of light toward a black hole, on a mission to probe the very fabric of space and time and test the laws of physics.

Astrophysicist Cosimo Bambi has proposed a century-long mission to send a “paperclip-sized nanocraft” to a black hole using a powerful laser beam. The purpose of this bold mission would be to test the foundations of physics and general relativity.

While the idea of sending a spacecraft to a black hole dozens of light-years from Earth might sound like something straight out of Interstellar, an astrophysicist is bringing science fiction a little closer to reality—or perhaps the other way around.

A new paper 01403-8)sketches a daring plan: launch a wafer-sized spacecraft toward the nearest black hole and let it report back on the most extreme physics in the cosmos. The author, astrophysicist Cosimo Bambi of Fudan University,