Warp drive. Interstellar flights.

The reasoning of scientists about potential future engines for interstellar flights. On such engines as: a solar sail or a photon sail, a nuclear engine based on the synthesis of nuclei, a thermonuclear engine on antimatter and a motor deforming the space warp engine. What time will it take for spacecraft working on such engines to fly to the nearest stellar system, such as Alpha Centauri.


Warp drive is a faster-than-light (FTL) spacecraft propulsion system in many science fiction works, most notably Star Trek. A spacecraft equipped with a warp drive may travel at speeds greater than that of light by many orders of magnitude. In contrast to other FTL technologies such as a jump drive or hyper drive, the warp drive does not permit instantaneous (or near instantaneous) travel between two points but involves a measurable passage of time which is problematic to the concept. Spacecraft at warp velocity theoretically continue to interact with objects in "normal space". The general concept of "warp drive" was introduced by John W. Campbell.

Einstein's theory of special relativity states that energy and mass are interchangeable, thus, speed of light travel is impossible for material objects that weigh more than photons. The problem of a material object exceeding light speed is that an infinitely increasing amount of kinetic energy is required to attempt moving as fast as a massless photon. This problem can theoretically be solved by warping space to move an object instead of increasing the kinetic energy of the object to do so.