Introducing Physical Warp Drives

Abstract

The Alcubierre warp drive is an exotic solution in general relativity. It allows for superluminal travel at the cost of enormous amounts of matter with negative mass density. For this reason, the Alcubierre warp drive has been widely considered unphysical. In this study, we develop a model of a general warp drive spacetime in classical relativity that encloses all existing warp drive definitions and allows for new metrics without the most serious issues present in the Alcubierre solution. We present the first general model for subluminal positive-energy, spherically symmetric warp drives; construct superluminal warp-drive solutions which satisfy quantum inequalities; provide optimizations for the Alcubierre metric that decrease the negative energy requirements by two orders of magnitude; and introduce a warp drive spacetime in which space capacity and the rate of time can be chosen in a controlled manner. Conceptually, we demonstrate that any warp drive, including the Alcubierre drive, is a shell of regular or exotic material moving inertially with a certain velocity. Therefore, any warp drive requires propulsion. We show that a class of subluminal, spherically symmetric warp drive spacetimes, at least in principle, can be constructed based on the physical principles known to humanity today.

Accepted in CQG, comments welcome

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Cited by in corpus (18)

• Generic warp drives violate the null energy condition
• Positive Energy Warp Drive from Hidden Geometric Structures
• Perfect fluid warp drive solutions with the cosmological constant
• Constant Velocity Physical Warp Drive Solution
• Influence of anisotropic matter on the Alcubierre metric and other related metrics: revisiting the problem of negative energy
• ADM mass in warp drive spacetimes
• Warp Drives and Closed Timelike Curves
• Escape from a black hole with spherical warp drive
• Analyzing Warp Drive Spacetimes with Warp Factory
• Obstacles from interstellar matters and distortion in warp drive superluminal travel scenario
• Visualization and analysis of the curvature invariants in the Alcubierre warp-drive spacetime
• Membrane Models as a Means of Propulsion in General Relativity: Super-Luminal Warp-Drive that Satisfies the Weak Energy Condition
• On the total energy conservation of the Alcubierre spacetime
• Warp Factory: A Numerical Toolkit for the Analysis and Optimization of Warp Drive Geometries
• Tractor beams, pressor beams, and stressor beams in general relativity
• A Closer Look at Natário's Zero-Expansion Warp Drive
• Scalar-tensor gravity and Aharonov-Bohm electrodynamics with bosons: applications to superconductors
• Quantum Otto engines at relativistic energies