Dr. Harold "Sonny" White from Eagleworks Laboratories, NASA, will present "Warp Field Mechanics 102 - How Hard is Interstellar Flight" on Thursday, March 21st at Noon in Tome 115.  Free pizza & everyone is welcome to attend!

Abstract: This talk identifies the colossal challenge of sending a robotic probe (let alone human mission) to our nearest stellar neighbor, and speculates on how, using a loophole in general relativity, we might bring the stars within our grasp. A short review of the Alcubierre warp drive metric is provided to describe how the idea of a space warp might work. The impractical energy requirements discussed in the literature are identified, and a warp bubble topology optimization approach is discussed. The idea of a warp drive in a higher dimensional space-time (manifold) is briefly considered by comparing the null-like geodesics of the Alcubierre metric to the Chung-Freese metric and another energy optimization technique is identified. The energy optimization results are presented and show that the idea of a space warp may have been moved from impractical to plausible. Finally, an overview of the warp field interferometer test bed being implemented in Eagleworks Laboratories at the Johnson Space Center will be detailed.