(Image source: Space.com )

BY STEVEN SPARKMAN

Sci-fi fans — NASA is trying to make warp drive a reality. That’s right, the form of faster-than-light travel popularized in Star Trek may actually be doable.

The story comes out of the 100 Year Starship Symposium, a government-backed project looking to iron out the kinks in interstellar travel.

Harold White of NASA’s Eagleworks lab presented his findings at the symposium. New technology could theoretically get around the speed-of-light limit without breaking the laws of physics.

It works like this: instead of trying to go fast, just make deep space come to you. By actually warping space-time, it’s possible to travel incredible speeds without your spaceship having to move at all. ( Video via Space.com )

The theory was first discovered by Mexican physicist Miguel Alcubierre in 1994. Michio Kaku on the Science Channel explains how it works.

“The empty space behind your starship expands rapidly, pushing you in the forward direction. In the same way for this walkway, new space constantly emerges which moves you along...”

By shrinking the space in front of you and stretching it behind you, your spaceship can rocket forward at ten times the speed of light. ( Via Space.com )

But there’s a problem: it would take more energy to move a ship across our galaxy than exists in the universe.

But White says with a little tweaking, he’s whittled the energy needed for Alcubierre’s equations down to a manageable size. He adds we may see a “‘Star Trek’ experience within our lifetime.”

White’s warp work lit up sci-fi forums, and prompted TV news anchors around the country to admit — they don’t know a thing about Star Trek.

“Absolutely amazing. Where you guys Star Trek fans? Did you guys pay attention to the TV show and the movies?”
“Sure.”
“No.” ( KMBC )

“I had a Captain Kirk shirt when I was a kid, but I never watched the show. I just... I don’t know why I had the shirt.” ( WITI )

But for those anxious to go where no one has gone before, the idea of traveling faster than light is huge. A writer for Gizmodo is already planning missions.

“[W]e would be able to visit Gliese 581g—a planet similar to Earth 20 light years away from our planet—in two years. Two years is nothing. It took Magellan three years to circumnavigate around our home planet … A four year roundtrip to see a planet like Earth is completely doable. ”

White has begun small-scale experiments to see just how difficult it would be to bend space-time.

In the meantime, Trekkies might be excited to hear Microsoft is developing tech for an “immersive display experience” which Ars Technica says sounds a lot like the Holodeck.