Warp Drive could Become Science fact - NASA small scale testing underway

[kynthrus]

Wouldn't it be funny if our entire concept of space-travel was revolutionized by some physicist saying "Hey, what if instead of a ring, we made it a donut?"

Isn't that how science has always worked?

[s_bushido]

When numbers are released, I'd find it interesting to see if this turns out to be true. [If I made a math mistake, please correct me.] At 10c, we'd turn a 5-10 month journey from Earth to Mars (at their closest point to each other and depending on speed) into a ~18 second journey or just a few minutes at their furthest (traveling around the Sun).

That'd mean a colony on Mars would have a constant supply line (and/or be a constant supply source for Earth). Depending on what's on Mars, if it can be terraformed, etc, it might be worth the inefficiency.

I think the concern for short trips would be either navigation (risking crashing into something) or acceleration/deceleration (being able to safely control the reaction over such a distance). I wish I knew enough about the subject to even begin to guess if there might be negative effects of manipulating spacetime so close to a planetary body.

[Jevlin]

When numbers are released, I'd find it interesting to see if this turns out to be true. [If I made a math mistake, please correct me.] At 10c, we'd turn a 5-10 month journey from Earth to Mars (at their closest point to each other and depending on speed) into a ~18 second journey or just a few minutes at their furthest (traveling around the Sun).

That'd mean a colony on Mars would have a constant supply line (and/or be a constant supply source for Earth). Depending on what's on Mars, if it can be terraformed, etc, it might be worth the inefficiency.

The cost to send a cluster of bananas would still be astronomical at best.
These crafts will probably not be aerodynamical and therefor cannot enter or leave an atmosphere without being ripped asunder.
Traditional means would have to be used such as fossil fueled space crafts or a space elevator (if that ever happens) to send goods from earth up to the warp ship and then at site down from the warp ship to the planet. Then we're talking about $10.000/ 1 KG again, that's one expensive banana cluster

The key to colonizing other planets is self-efficiency and don't think that'll ever change even with technology.

I think the concern for short trips would be either navigation (risking crashing into something) or acceleration/deceleration (being able to safely control the reaction over such a distance). I wish I knew enough about the subject to even begin to guess if there might be negative effects of manipulating spacetime so close to a planetary body.

Also this^

[Wikiy]

720 kg of energy = 6.5x10^19? Units? Sorry, but I'm not great with energy physics. And if you don't mind another question, would it just be a process of having that much mass available? Like even garbage or something similar? Or would fusion reactors need something specific?

Sorry, 6,5x10^19 J. Which is 65 quintillion on the short scale (million-10^6, billion-10^9, trillion-10^12, quadrilion-10^15, quintillion-10^18) and 65 trillion on the long scale, used by most European countries (million-10^6, milliard-10^9, billion-10^12, billiard-10^15, trillion-10^18). Which is, as Fuzzzie also said, 16 megatons of TNT.

Oh, and about fusion power, it would technically work for half of the elements, but under the right conditions. The "fuel" used most is a mixture of dilithium and tritium (2 types of hydrogen besides the main one, but they're extremely abundant on Earth, so you don't need to worry about fuel shortages in future.

[kivipää]

But it was loosely pointed out in the article (quote below) that a continuous output would not be required to sustain this warp state.

Just to note that this is the worst case scenario. It means the system needs to have a momentary input amounting to that energy. If it had required continuous input totalling to the announced energy requirement we could have made do with much smaller power source. Since at a given point in time input must be this high, that many nuclear reactors have to be plugged in simultaneously at least at one point in time, and so whether we need to have them at the next point in time is irreleveant. We still need to have that kind of a power source. And we propably need to have it with us if we ever want to stop the process. Or do a return trip, at least.

[semaphore]

The cost to send a cluster of bananas would still be astronomical at best.
These crafts will probably not be aerodynamical and therefor cannot enter or leave an atmosphere without being ripped asunder.
Traditional means would have to be used such as fossil fueled space crafts or a space elevator (if that ever happens) to send goods from earth up to the warp ship and then at site down from the warp ship to the planet. Then we're talking about $10.000/ 1 KG again, that's one expensive banana cluster

If we ever begin interstellar expansion in earnest, I expect we'd have to build space elevators to replace atmospheric entry. The cost of achieving escape velocity alone will render anything spacey uneconomical.

[kivipää]

The cost to send a cluster of bananas would still be astronomical at best.
These crafts will probably not be aerodynamical and therefor cannot enter or leave an atmosphere without being ripped asunder.
Traditional means would have to be used such as fossil fueled space crafts or a space elevator (if that ever happens) to send goods from earth up to the warp ship and then at site down from the warp ship to the planet. Then we're talking about $10.000/ 1 KG again, that's one expensive banana cluster

if we could move at that kind of speeds within the solar system, cost of fuel for orbit-surface travel would disappear from the equation completely. There are places in the solar system, like Titan, for example, where it literally rains fuel.

[Wells]

If we ever begin interstellar expansion in earnest, I expect we'd have to build space elevators to replace atmospheric entry. The cost of achieving escape velocity alone will render anything spacey uneconomical.

If this venture program to extract minerals from the asteroid belt takes off you can expect a space elevator along shortly after. Don't have to wait for interstellar travel, just have to wait for a major profit based industry that could use one.

[semaphore]

If this venture program to extract minerals from the asteroid belt takes off you can expect a space elevator along shortly after. Don't have to wait for interstellar travel, just have to wait for a major profit based industry that could use one.

That's true, interstellar was a bad choice of words.

[Torq]

Sorry, 6,5x10^19 J. Which is 65 quintillion on the short scale (million-10^6, billion-10^9, trillion-10^12, quadrilion-10^15, quintillion-10^18) and 65 trillion on the long scale, used by most European countries (million-10^6, milliard-10^9, billion-10^12, billiard-10^15, trillion-10^18). Which is, as Fuzzzie also said, 16 megatons of TNT.

Oh, and about fusion power, it would technically work for half of the elements, but under the right conditions. The "fuel" used most is a mixture of dilithium and tritium (2 types of hydrogen besides the main one, but they're extremely abundant on Earth, so you don't need to worry about fuel shortages in future.

I think you mean deuterium.

[Slacker76]

By author Seth Mnookin:
http://blogs.plos.org/thepanicvirus/...ng-circa-2012/

Because it’s sexier to discover something than to show there’s nothing to be discovered, high-impact journals show a marked preference for "initial studies" as opposed to disconfirmations. Unfortunately, as anyone who has ever worked in a research lab knows, initial observations are almost inevitably refuted or heavily attenuated by future studies — and that data tends to get printed in less prestigious journals. Newspapers, meanwhile, give lots of attention to those first, eye-catching results while spilling very little (if any) ink on the ongoing research that shows why people shouldn’t have gotten all hot and bothered in the first place. (I have a high degree of confidence that the same phenomenon occurs regardless of the medium, but the PLOS ONE study only examined print newspapers.)

[cubby]

Sorry, 6,5x10^19 J. Which is 65 quintillion on the short scale (million-10^6, billion-10^9, trillion-10^12, quadrilion-10^15, quintillion-10^18) and 65 trillion on the long scale, used by most European countries (million-10^6, milliard-10^9, billion-10^12, billiard-10^15, trillion-10^18). Which is, as Fuzzzie also said, 16 megatons of TNT.

Oh, and about fusion power, it would technically work for half of the elements, but under the right conditions. The "fuel" used most is a mixture of dilithium and tritium (2 types of hydrogen besides the main one, but they're extremely abundant on Earth, so you don't need to worry about fuel shortages in future.

Sweet. Looking forward to first fusion, then cruising Alpha Centari.

[FyreRT]

Cowboy Bebop in 2071, true story.

[Fogged]

Someone please come wake me up from under my rock when we have replicators and holodecks. So I can eat with 0 effort and do questionable things in privacy.

[Wikiy]

I think you mean deuterium.

FAIL. Star Trek and its damned influence. Oh well, at least i knew it started on a "d". xD