Constraints on the Abundance of 0.01 c Stellar Engines in the Milky Way

Abstract

Stellar engines are hypothesized megastructures that extract energy from the host star, typically with the purpose of generating thrust and accelerating the stellar system. We explore the maximum potential speeds that could be realizable by stellar engines, and determine that speeds up to ∼0.1 c might perhaps be attainable under optimal conditions. In contrast, natural astrophysical phenomena in the Milky Way are very unlikely to produce such speeds. Hence, astrometric surveys of hypervelocity stars may be utilized to conduct commensal searches for high-speed stellar engines in the Milky Way. It may be possible to derive bounds on their abundance, but this requires certain assumptions regarding the spatiotemporal distribution of such engines, which are not guaranteed to be valid.