A Feasible Warp Drive

Discussion in 'Science and Technology' started by DocWho, May 3, 2013.

  1. DocWho

    DocWho Member

    Messages:
    48
    Likes Received:
    4

    Warp Drive May Be More Feasible Than Thought, Scientists Say


    HOUSTON — 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.


    Warping space-time

    An Alcubierre warp drive would involve a football-shape spacecraft attached to a large ring encircling it. This ring, potentially made of exotic matter, would cause space-time to warp around the starship, creating a region of contracted space in front of it and expanded space behind.

    Meanwhile, the starship itself would stay inside a bubble of flat space-time that wasn't being warped at all.

    "Everything within space is restricted by the speed of light," explained Richard Obousy, president of Icarus Interstellar, a non-profit group of scientists and engineers devoted to pursuing interstellar spaceflight. "But the really cool thing is space-time, the fabric of space, is not limited by the speed of light."

    With this concept, the spacecraft would be able to achieve an effective speed of about 10 times the speed of light, all without breaking the cosmic speed limit.

    The only problem is, previous studies estimated the warp drive would require a minimum amount of energy about equal to the mass-energy of the planet Jupiter.

    But recently White calculated what would happen if the shape of the ring encircling the spacecraft was adjusted into more of a rounded donut, as opposed to a flat ring. He found in that case, the warp drive could be powered by a mass about the size of a spacecraft like the Voyager 1 probe NASA launched in 1977.

    Furthermore, if the intensity of the space warps can be oscillated over time, the energy required is reduced even more, White found.

    "The findings I presented today change it from impractical to plausible and worth further investigation," White told SPACE.com. "The additional energy reduction realized by oscillating the bubble intensity is an interesting conjecture that we will enjoy looking at in the lab."

    :sunny:

    http://www.space.com/17628-warp-drive-possible-interstellar-spaceflight.html
     
  2. eatlysergicacid

    eatlysergicacid Creep in a T-Shirt

    Messages:
    1,762
    Likes Received:
    4
    Doesn't sound promising. I have a feeling that discovering this "exotic matter" which warps space time is not quite as simple a task as this article seems to suggest.
     
  3. Justin_Hale

    Justin_Hale ( •_•)⌐■-■ ...(⌐■_■)

    Messages:
    4,080
    Likes Received:
    361
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJJ-4lnwrck"]TR-3B Plasma Torus Anti-Gravity Centrifuge Engine - YouTube
     

Share This Page

  1. This site uses cookies to help personalise content, tailor your experience and to keep you logged in if you register.
    By continuing to use this site, you are consenting to our use of cookies.
    Dismiss Notice