Planets in science fiction are fictional planets that appear in various media of the science fiction genre as story-settings or depicted locations.
A space habitat is a more advanced form of living quarters than a space station or habitation module, in that it is intended as a permanent settlement or green habitat rather than as a simple way-station or other specialized facility. No space habitat has been constructed yet, but many design concepts, with varying degrees of realism, have come both from engineers and from science-fiction authors.
A sleeper ship is a hypothetical type of crewed spacecraft in which most or all of the crew spend the journey in some form of hibernation or suspended animation. The only known technology that allows long-term suspended animation of humans is the freezing of early-stage human embryos through embryo cryopreservation, which is behind the concept of embryo space colonization.
A megastructure is a very large artificial object, although the limits of precisely how large vary considerably. Some apply the term to any especially large or tall building. Some sources define a megastructure as an enormous self-supporting artificial construct. The products of megascale engineering or astroengineering are megastructures. The lower bound of megastructural engineering might be considered any structure that has any single dimension 1 megameter (1000 km) in length.
This is a list of occurrences of space elevators in fiction. Some depictions were made before the space elevator concept became fully established.
A space dock is a hypothesised type of space station that is able to repair or build spacecraft similar to maritime shipyards on Earth. They remove the need for new spacecraft to perform a space launch to reach space and existing spacecraft to make an atmospheric entry and landing for repair work. They currently only exist in fiction, however concept work has been undertaken on real space dock facilities that could be built with current technology.
The picturesque planet Saturn is featured in numerous works of science fiction. Early works of science fiction used Saturn itself as a location for stories, but modern science has shown that the planet has no solid surface on which one could land, and that its atmosphere and temperature are hostile to human life. As a result, the Saturnian system as a whole, including its planetary rings and its extensive system of moons, is a more common setting for science fiction.
Brewster Rockit: Space Guy! is a satirical retro-futuristic comic strip created by Tim Rickard. It chronicles the misadventures of the dim-witted Brewster Rockit, captain of the space station R.U. Sirius, and his crew. Many of the comic's characters and elements are derived from the Star Trek franchise, American science fiction films of the 1950s, and science fiction comics of the 1940s and 1950s. It debuted on July 5, 2004, and is nationally syndicated by Tribune Content Agency.
Asteroids and asteroid belts are a staple of science fiction stories. Asteroids play several potential roles in science fiction, most notably as places which human beings might colonize, as resources for extracting minerals, as a hazard encountered by spaceships traveling between two other points, and as a threat to life on Earth due to potential impacts.
As one of the brightest stars in Earth's night sky, and the closest-known star system to the Sun, the Alpha Centauri system plays an important role in many fictional works of literature, popular culture, television, and film.
Jupiter's extensive system of natural satellites – in particular the four large Galilean moons – has been a common science fiction setting.
The fictional portrayal of the Solar System has often included planets, moons, and other celestial objects which do not actually exist in reality. Some of these objects were, at one time, seriously considered as hypothetical planets which were either thought to have been observed, or were hypothesized to be orbiting the Sun in order to explain certain celestial phenomena. Often such objects continued to be used in literature long after the hypotheses upon which they were based had been abandoned.
The planetary systems of stars other than the Sun and the Solar System are a staple element in much science fiction. Epsilon Eridani is the fifth-brightest star in the riverine southern constellation of Eridanus. An orange star slightly smaller and less massive than the Sun, and relatively close to the Solar System, it is frequently featured in works of science fiction. It is classified as a type K2 star, with the corresponding suggestion that it has a stable habitable zone and is well suited for life. However, one factor which weakens the case for habitability is its youth—as little as 200 million years old—and consequent high levels of ultraviolet emission.
The planetary systems of stars other than the Sun and the Solar System are a staple element in many works of the science fiction genre.
The concepts of space stations and habitats are common in modern culture. While space stations have become reality, there are as yet no true space habitats. Writers, filmmakers, and other artists have produced vivid renditions of the idea of a space station or habitat, and these iterations can be categorized by some of the basic scientific concepts from which they are derived.
A rotating wheel space station, also known as a donut city or a von Braun wheel, is a concept for a hypothetical wheel-shaped space station. Originally proposed by Konstantin Tsiolkovsky in 1903, the idea was expanded by Herman Potočnik in 1929.
Artificial gravity is a common theme in fiction, particularly science fiction.
Engineering on an astronomical scale, or astronomical engineering, i.e., engineering involving operations with whole astronomical objects, is a known theme in science fiction, as well as a matter of recent scientific research and exploratory engineering.
