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The Alcubierre drive ([alkuˈβjere]) is a speculative warp drive idea according to which a spacecraft could achieve apparent faster-than-light travel by contracting space in front of it and expanding space behind it, under the assumption that a configurable energy-density field lower than that of vacuum (that is, negative mass) could be created.
The idea of a warp drive is particularly appealing because it’s technically describable within general relativity, as the Mexican theoretical physicist Miguel Alcubierre proposed back in 1994.
A revolutionary study introduces a warp drive model compatible with known physics, offering a scientifically grounded approach to faster-than-light travel.
Warp drive, or a drive enabling space warp, is one of several ways of travelling through space found in science fiction. [3] It has been often discussed as being conceptually similar to hyperspace. [3] [4]: 238–239 A warp drive is a device that distorts the shape of the space-time continuum.
Miguel Alcubierre theorized that it would be possible to create a warp drive, in which a ship would be enclosed in a "warp bubble" where the space at the front of the bubble is rapidly contracting and the space at the back is rapidly expanding, with the result that the bubble can reach a distant destination much faster than a light beam moving ...
Intergalactic travel for humans is therefore possible, in theory, from the point of view of the traveler. [7] For example, a rocket that accelerated at standard acceleration due to gravity toward the Andromeda Galaxy and started to decelerate halfway through the trip would arrive in about 28 years, from the frame of reference of the observer. [8]
Certain kinds of hypothetical spacetimes called warp drives, which in a sense can be said to admit a kind of faster-than-light inertia-less and time-dilation-less travel, have been studied by some theoretical physicists since about 1990. This category contains articles related to such theoretical speculations.
These included the gravity-based pitch drive, bias drive, disjunction drive and diametric drive; the Alcubierre drive; and the vacuum energy based differential sail. [13] The project then considered the mechanisms behind these drives. At the end of the project, three mechanisms were identified as areas for future research.