Posted on 09/17/2012 10:28:10 AM PDT by justlurking
A warp drive to achieve faster-than-light travel — a concept popularized in television's Star Trek — may not be as unrealistic as once thought, scientists say.
A warp drive would manipulate space-time itself to move a starship, taking advantage of a loophole in the laws of physics that prevent anything from moving faster than light. A concept for a real-life warp drive was suggested in 1994 by Mexican physicist Miguel Alcubierre, however subsequent calculations found that such a device would require prohibitive amounts of energy.
Now physicists say that adjustments can be made to the proposed warp drive that would enable it to run on significantly less energy, potentially bringing the idea back from the realm of science fiction into science.
"There is hope," Harold "Sonny" White of NASA's Johnson Space Center said here Friday (Sept. 14) at the 100 Year Starship Symposium, a meeting to discuss the challenges of interstellar spaceflight.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Theoretically the vessel would not be moving any faster, but the effects on humans from passing into warped space would have to be studied. Warped humans??
The beauty of it is that for the vehicle inside the warp there is very little (if any) acceleration or deceleration. The vehicle itself is moving at much slower speeds within the warp bubble while space itself is moved around it. In theory the vehicle could remain stationary.
It’s dilithium ;-)
Okay, thanks.
That sort of makes sense....kind of mind bending too!
It’s tough to wrap your mind around but the bubble doesn’t actually move. You need to break out of the mindset that there is some sort of definite, unchanging, grid of “space” that you “move” through.
...encased in pure unobtainium.
Thanks guys, I’m getting it now.
It is established. It’s the next part in Einstein’s treatise where he said we couldn’t break the speed of light. Everybody pays attention to his energy curve part but only the hardcore nerd bother with the part where he says the solution is to condense space within a field and fly through that. I don’t know if anybody in Star Trek had actually read that part when they came up with the warp bubble, but the concept definitely pre-exists Trek.
Energy may not be the tough part here.
Even an "exotic" material will need to interact with space/time in ways that nothing else has been able to do that we have found to date. I'm interested in seeing exactly what criteria they think will be required to get this perturbation of space/time to occur within their parameters.
“What’s the matter Colonel Sanders? Are you chicken?”
Because you are changing your “at rest” state relative to local gravity. With a warp drive like this, it is that “local gravity” that is moving. You’d feel nothing.
Ok, but what happens to everybody and everything between NYC and Nashville. There has to be some consequence to bending space.
Yeah....I'll get right on that.
I suppose that it's good for people to dream. My only problem is when "dreams" get reported as "news". Or worse, "science".
Very bad things, which is why it’s only for interstellar space travel, where there’s nothing to be squished.
eh, flyover country...
seriously... you wouldn’t warp space anywhere near a planet or even within the solar system ideally.
“You can theoretically create an environment in which a perpetual motion machine will work.”
I see you’ve met the Democrat Party.
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