(NewsNation) — As we ponder how beings from “out there” may be here on earth, scientists are also looking at the companion to that question: how would we earthlings travel “out there?”
A group of scientists have written software to help others look for ways to reconcile the science fiction of Star Trek’s warp drive propulsion system with the facts of physics as we know it.
The international science and engineering consortium Applied Physics recently released “Warp Factory,” a software toolkit that enables users to analyze their warp drive theories.
“Physicists can now generate and refine an array of warp drive designs with just a few clicks, allowing us to advance science at warp speed,” said Gianni Martire, CEO of Applied Physics, in a news release. “Warp Factory serves as a virtual wind tunnel, enabling us to test and evaluate different warp designs. Science fiction is now inching closer to science fact,” he added.
For decades, scientists have published theoretical and speculative papers built on the idea that Star Trek’s spacetime-folding warp bubbles could happen. It was first mathematically modeled by Mexican physicist Miguel Alcubierre in 1994.
His idea for a spacecraft traveling faster than the speed of light is this: contract spacetime in front of spacecraft and expand spacetime behind the craft – creating a so-called “warp bubble.”
“By a purely local expansion of spacetime behind the spaceship and an opposite contraction in front of it, motion faster than the speed of light as seen by observers outside the disturbed region is possible,” Alcubierre wrote.
The big roadblock in Alcubierre’s theory is that it requires negative energy. But there is no known existing technology that can create a space with, in effect, less-than-zero energy.
But that’s just us. Earthlings, that is. The rest of the universe may be another matter. One theory is that, if warp bubbles do exist, they could collapse. And those collapsing bubbles could emit gravitational waves that our technology could detect. And if we detect such an event, it may be evidence that some advanced civilization has mastered the technology.