Warp Drive May Be Possible

Warp Drive powers the fictional starship Enterprise on its faster-than-light voyages.  Physicists have held, however, that the amount of energy required to make that work-- the energy equivalent of a mass the size of Jupiter-- makes such a project impractical.

A new approach, though, cuts the energy needed way down, to the equivalent of a mass the size of the Voyager spacecraft.  With tweaks. that energy requirement could drop even more.  That massive drop, some researchers say, makes WD worthy of more serious study.  Theoretically, WD could reach speeds of ten times the speed of light.  That would throw open the galaxy to human exploration.