4 hours ago
(This post was last modified: 4 hours ago by C C.)
https://www.popularmechanics.com/science...-possible/
EXCERPTS: In a surprising paper from 2021, scientists Alexey Bobrick and Gianni Martire suggested that they’d nailed down a physical model for a warp drive, which flew in the face of what we’ve long thought about the crazy concept of warp speed travel: that it requires exotic, negative forces. The paper proposed a broader way to classify warp-drive spacetimes.
In some subluminal cases, the authors argued, a warp bubble could be described using positive energy rather than the exotic negative energy that has haunted the idea since Miguel Alcubierre’s famous 1994 proposal. To best understand what the breakthrough means, you’ll need a quick crash course on the far-out idea of traveling through folded space—because warp drive has always sounded cleaner in science fiction than it does in general relativity.
[...] Essentially, an Alcubierre drive would expend a tremendous amount of energy—likely more than what’s available within the universe and, more awkwardly, negative energy—to contract and twist space-time in front of it and create a bubble. ... For years, the negative-energy requirement was the bugaboo. Alcubierre’s original concept was mathematically allowed, but it demanded the kind of matter and energy budget no one knows how to supply.
[...] That’s why Bobrick and Martire’s 2021 paper drew so much attention. ... While newer research hasn’t killed the idea of a physical warp drive, it’s certainly thrown some cold water on it. ... Finally, there’s still the problem of stability... So, none of this gives engineers a warp drive. The concept is still in the “far future” zone of possibility, made of ideas that scientists still don’t know how to construct in any sense... (MORE - missing details)
EXCERPTS: In a surprising paper from 2021, scientists Alexey Bobrick and Gianni Martire suggested that they’d nailed down a physical model for a warp drive, which flew in the face of what we’ve long thought about the crazy concept of warp speed travel: that it requires exotic, negative forces. The paper proposed a broader way to classify warp-drive spacetimes.
In some subluminal cases, the authors argued, a warp bubble could be described using positive energy rather than the exotic negative energy that has haunted the idea since Miguel Alcubierre’s famous 1994 proposal. To best understand what the breakthrough means, you’ll need a quick crash course on the far-out idea of traveling through folded space—because warp drive has always sounded cleaner in science fiction than it does in general relativity.
[...] Essentially, an Alcubierre drive would expend a tremendous amount of energy—likely more than what’s available within the universe and, more awkwardly, negative energy—to contract and twist space-time in front of it and create a bubble. ... For years, the negative-energy requirement was the bugaboo. Alcubierre’s original concept was mathematically allowed, but it demanded the kind of matter and energy budget no one knows how to supply.
[...] That’s why Bobrick and Martire’s 2021 paper drew so much attention. ... While newer research hasn’t killed the idea of a physical warp drive, it’s certainly thrown some cold water on it. ... Finally, there’s still the problem of stability... So, none of this gives engineers a warp drive. The concept is still in the “far future” zone of possibility, made of ideas that scientists still don’t know how to construct in any sense... (MORE - missing details)