But Seriously, A Warp Drive?

Seriously, a warp drive.

As I mentioned in my last post (A 3D Future?), the idea that something like a warp drive could work within the laws of physics might easily be the most exciting concept of the next 100 years, although one based purely in theory and requiring significant funding and effort.

The science for the idea has been around since 1994 from theoretical physicist Miguel Alcubierre.  He wrapped theoretical science like relativity around the stunning idea that humans can travel faster than the speed of light to come up with the Alcubierre Drive.  When Einstein came up with the theory of relativity mankind began to unravel the mysteries of physics and the universe.  Einstein's famous formula says that E=MC2, or, energy equals mass times the speed of light squared.  Therefore, as we near zero mass (molecule/photon small), to have any significant energy would require immense speed.  The greatest speed we could imagine is the speed of light in a vacuum (no friction) which comes out to just over 186,000 MPH.  Except that's not true.

The Alcubierre Drive, Colorful Lights Not Included

A Simple Quote From A Super Simple Man

The key to this is dark energy.  Dark energy is 75%-85% of matter in the universe yet we know very little about it.  Think of dark matter as the water of the Pacific Ocean, with planets, stars, or anything else with mass represented by fish.  If the fastest fish swims forward at 150,000 MPH (less than the speed of light) we can observe this speed.  However, we're also in the current moving across the Pacific at an additional 200,000 MPH, but this is relative to us so we still say the fish is moving 150,000 MPH, not 350,000 MPH.  Dark matter is the water we float in, and it doesn't follow normal rules.  Imagine pushing a few Skittles into a Play-Doh disk and then stretching the Play-Doh out, the Play-Doh is the expanding fabric of the universe that is pushing planets (Skittles) further away from each other.  To conclude, dark matter can expand and contract faster than the speed of light.  The Alcubierre Drive is simply finding a way to ride that wave.

Not Play-Doh

Artists Interpretation Of Dark Matter, Allegedly

The Alcubierre Drive itself is not a spacecraft, but rather a device attached to a spacecraft that creates a massive amount of energy, expands space behind your ship, and contracts space in front of the ship.  If you refer to the picture below the mechanics are more obvious.  The (1) on the left side is space being expanded behind the ship (think of a wave coming up out of the ocean propelling you forward), while the (3) on the right side is space being contracted in front of the ship (literally there is less space between the ship and its destination, like a breaking wave).

Imagine Turning Headlights On Going Faster Than Light

Hopefully you're excited about the possibilities at this point, but there are many difficulties still standing in the way of this becoming reality, the first of which is the need for massive amounts of energy.  Initially Alcubierre formulated that to generate enough energy to bend space would require a Jupiter sized object.  However in 2011 Harold White (a NASA engineer) played with the equation and and discovered that a slight change in shape and thickness could shrink the required equipment from Jupiter sized to 1,600 pounds!  The technology to generate the energy would most likely utilize something called the Casimir Effect for those interested, but that's a whole other article in itself.  Additional problems include that what happens within the expanding/contracting bubble as well as the effects of decelerating from such a high speed are unknown.  Either way, the theory has enough roots in reality that NASA moved the project up from 'conjecture' to 'speculation'.

North America To Scale On Jupiter. Keep Running Forrest.

If we can ignore the fact that such technology may take decades to work, if it ever does at all, we can imagine some truly awesome possibilities.  In terms of speed, travelling to our closest neighbor star takes over 4 years at the speed of light, but only about 2 weeks with Alcubierre's Drive. Extrapolating forward that means that humans would suddenly possess the ability to travel to other hospitable planets, and either colonize or meet colonies of other galaxies.  Limited resources would suddenly be unlimited with the ability to mine/collect these resources from unique asteroids and planets everywhere.

Like the Earth sized planet made out of diamond 40 light years away worth $26.9 Nonillion, or for those like me not well versed in numbers over the Trillions: $26,900,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.

That's Gonna Be One Lucky Girl

If the Alcubierre Drive doesn't work we can always look at the Krasnikov tube or worm holes.  Until then just hope we see something like this in our lifetimes, it would be more important than just about every invention leading up to it, combined.  Plus I'd really love to shake hands with an alien.

-Ryan Gardner