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Ethan S. Conrad

Malcolm Campbell

UWRT 1104

12 February 2019

The Future of Space Travel

Introduction/Overview:

I am choosing to write about something that may not be completely relevant to most

peoples lives in the moment but will play a key role in the near future of our species. This topic

is the proposition of the warp drive through the mechanics of warp fields via the manipulation of

space-time; what exactly it is and why it is important. The idea of a warp drive is based on

science fiction, moreover, the term “warp drive” was popularized by the 1960’s show Star Trek.

In the show, a warp drive engine allowed their ship to travel at speeds that were faster than light.

Of course, at the time this was seen as nothing more than science fiction but in 1994, Miguel

Alcubierre, researcher of physics at Cardiff University, proposed that maybe this was more

possible than we once thought, and it may even hold the key to us as a species being able to zip

around the cosmos. The research is being continued to this day through NASA who has set up a

team of astrophysicists to conduct research on the topic. To get an initial idea on what a warp

drive is and what it can do for us, I read Dr. Alcubierre’s essay detailing his proposition and took

a quick glance at the actual mathematics being hacked out by the monkeys at NASA.

It is stated as a rule in general relativity that an object with mass (so really all objects)

cannot exceed the speed of light, which is actually pretty slow compared to the scale of space.

However, a warp drive will allow you to travel faster than the speed of light whilst not breaking

any laws of physics. This is done by creating a distortion in space-time causing a contraction at
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the front of the ship and an expansion at the back. This would then propel the ship in the

direction that it is wanting to go and deliver it there in an arbitrarily short amount of time.

Most people wouldn’t expect there to be as much controversy in physics as there really is.

All of modern physics can simply be divided between two sides with those who vehemently

defend what they research. That is those who think that gravity must be a force, these people

include Einstein and Kip Thorne, and those who think that gravity is a particle, such as Dr.

Stephen Hawking. My topic undergoes the same arguments as all the other proposed theories in

this field and since warp drive depends on both gravity, a hot topic in physics, and the reliance

on dark matter and dark energy, basically a nuclear football in physics, it can be argued whether

or not this is just the ramblings of another mad scientist. The reason gravity and dark matter are

controversial in today’s world of physics is due to warp drive needing to warp the space-time in

front and in the back of the ship to propel it. The only possible way to get enough energy to warp

space-time is through dark energy that come from dark matter. Dark matter is what makes up

around 95% of the universe and at the moment there is very little that we know about it. Using

the knowledge that all matter that has mass has its own gravity field and holds energy, we can

deduce that dark matter, or anti-matter, will have anti-gravity fields and dark energy, the very

components needed to warp space-time.

Initial Inquiry Questions:

What is warp drive? Does it really hold the key to the future of space travel and if so

how? Will we see it in out lifetime? And other fun questions but the first two are my main two.

My Interests in the Topic:

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I’m interested in warp drive mechanics and all the sorts for many reasons. These include

my interest in space, my wanting to help us as a species explore the galaxy, and my love for

physics. My father is a huge nerd meaning I grew up to be one too but as a child I was being

influenced by cultural tropes such as the music he listened to (Rush) and things he watched (Star

Wars and Star Trek). I remember a distinct line from an episode of Star Trek where Kirk told his

crew to start the warp drive engine to get them away from a sticky situation and thinking to

myself how neat the concept was only to find myself many years later basing my life around

trying to turn science fiction to applicable science and watching what I grew up with become

real. For as long as I can remember, space travel and physics have played an integral role in my

development of who I am today and what I love to do.

I am going into this with a bit of preliminary knowledge of the topic, meaning I can

explain how it works in a very general way. I know the idea and what it can do for us as humans,

but the mathematics are definitely fuzzy and to have an in-depth discussion on making a warp

drive engine is right now an outright possibility. What I am hoping to get out of this is the ability

to talk about this to whomever may be interested in a way that it will be easy for both of us to

understand and, of course, a better working knowledge of the application of equations and the

overall proposed mathematics.

Next Steps:

To research this topic further, I will read more of Miguel Alubierre’s proposal essay as

well as using what NASA has published. I will also use the help of videos about the topic from

credible sources, such as Kurzgesagt and PBS-Spacetime, on YouTube to receive a better

understanding on the general theory and applications.

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