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Warp Drive May Be More Feasible Than Thought, Scientists Say
"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 brining the idea back from the realm of science fiction into science." See: http://news.yahoo.com/warp-drive-may...09.html?_esi=1 |
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Warp Drive May Be More Feasible Than Thought, Scientists Say
On 18/09/2012 05:45, Orval Fairbairn wrote:
In article , wrote: "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 brining the idea back from the realm of science fiction into science." See: http://news.yahoo.com/warp-drive-may...tists-16130110 9.html?_esi=1 I would think that some form of manipulation of the time/space continuum would be necessary to enable interstellar travel. Chemical rockets simply don't have the right stuff. If we actually WERE able to approach C, collisions with interstellar dust and gas would create lethal radiation and impact hazards, while unmapped rocks and planets would doom a mission. Of course, we would have to learn new laws of navigation, stability and control for such an endeavor. Though the entire idea behind space travel in Sci-Fi novel Dune is laughable - you have to hand it to author Frank Herbert for devising a way of traveling without moving by utilizing 'spice'. That avoids light speed collision problems entirely. -- T |
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Warp Drive May Be More Feasible Than Thought, Scientists Say
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Warp Drive May Be More Feasible Than Thought, Scientists Say
A quote from the article and a comment...
/quote 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. /end-quote Are we just re-inventing the flying saucer? |
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Warp Drive May Be More Feasible Than Thought, Scientists Say
On 9/22/2012 8:04 AM, Dave U. Random wrote:
http://news.yahoo.com/warp-drive-may...09.html?_esi=1 Some news articles claim that Warp 10 would be equal to 10 times the speed of light. That is obviously wrong and I reckon they didn't pay much attention when watching Star Trek. Well at much risk of revealing the kind of Trek knowledge that I preferred my wife didn't know I know :-) , ummm, obviously they never read the "Star Fleet Technical Manual"... IIRC (been awhile) Warp Factor goes up as the CUBE of C. Thus Warp 1 == C, Warp 2 == C**3, Warp 3 == C**6... etc.... FWIW (which is not much) Dave http://www.amazon.com/Star-Trek-Star...dp/0345495861/ |
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Warp Drive May Be More Feasible Than Thought, Scientists Say
On 9/18/2012 3:49 PM, Doug Freyburger wrote:
wrote: "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. At one time Stephen Hawking reported that he was working on such a drive. SH has also written that many a young physicist, while they may have done excellent work in their younger days, by the time they have established themselves eventually go daft and drift into the realm of cosmology. Is this what happens when you stay in cosmology too long? ;-) Dave |
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Warp Drive May Be More Feasible Than Thought, Scientists Say
On 9/17/2012 8:45 PM, Orval Fairbairn wrote:
I would think that some form of manipulation of the time/space continuum would be necessary to enable interstellar travel. Chemical rockets simply don't have the right stuff. If we actually WERE able to approach C, collisions with interstellar dust and gas would create lethal radiation and impact hazards, while unmapped rocks and planets would doom a mission. Of course, we would have to learn new laws of navigation, stability and control for such an endeavor. Many a "Warp Drive" scenario envision a folding of space-time in a non-inertial reference frame (whatever that means), but it usually implies you are not "thrusting" through space, so much as popping in and out. To avoid the hazards you mention you'd need a robotic "pre-popper" that pops ahead of you and if it survives the jump takes a look around sees that its ok and then pops back to you so that you can make the jump. The Star Trek scenario envisions a Space-Time "bubble" gets created around the ship under Warp Drive that allows you to "slip-between" objects in space time, and for those objects only that are directly in your path that are either small enough or far enough way, the giant forward facing "deflector" either moves it aside or moves you slightly aside to avoid it. All done with inertial "damping" so you don't feel the effect...until it fails that is... Or so I've been told... ;-) Dave |
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Warp Drive May Be More Feasible Than Thought, Scientists Say
On 9/24/2012 11:51 AM, Fred J. McCall wrote:
Not to worry. You got it wrong, so you're safe with your wife. My head knew the 'Original Series' system, which is based on cubes, as you said, but it's not C that gets raised to a power. That would make even Warp 2 preposterously fast. The original system said that each 'Warp Factor' was the speed of light TIMES the Warp Factor cubed. Thus Warp 1 = c, Warp 2 = 8c, Warp 3 = 27c, Warp 4 = 64c, etc. Ah yes, this does ring a bell! Whew safe after all!!!! Thanks Fred.... This was apparently changed after the Original Series (unbeknownst to me) in order to make 'Warp 10' the ultimate speed. In the old system it was Warp 20. which turns out to be roughly equivalent to Warp 9.99 in the 'New System'. There doesn't seem to be a 'reasonable' calculation for the 'New Warp Factor'. Yep I remember that too. In the episode about the trip to Andromeda, the aliens modify the Warp Engines to delivery above Warp 10, something like Warp 12 or Warp 15, fast enough to blast through the 'negative energy barrier' w/o problems, includng anyone in the crew with an ESP issue, which would have made for an even MORE interesting episode.... Dave |
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Warp Drive May Be More Feasible Than Thought, Scientists Say
: David Spain
: Many a "Warp Drive" scenario envision a folding of space-time in a : non-inertial reference frame (whatever that means), but it usually : implies you are not "thrusting" through space, so much as popping in : and out. Nah, that's more like the Polysotechnic League's quantum microjump drives. |
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