The Alcubierre faster-than-light travel system (often abbreviated to FTL drive or Alcubierre drive) is a warp drive model which, by processing dark matter into exotic matter through the use of a Dark Matter Handling System (abbreviated to DMHS), allow spacecraft to travel faster than the speed of light (approx. 300,000,000 m/s, or 1c) by manipulating spacetime through what is referred to as "folding" - contracting space in front of an object to "pull" it through space, and expanding space behind an object to "push" it. An Alcubierre faster-than-light travel system is capable, at operating speed, of crossing one lightyear in nine days.
Using exotic matter that, when refined from dark matter possessing the attributes of no reaction with the electromagnetic field, and negative mass, combines said attributes with normal matter, creating a type of matter that is invisible, has negative mass, but at the same time is able to interact with normal matter. Exotic matter and the Alcubierre faster-than-light drive are consistent with the conservation of momentum and energy, and the Einstein field equations.
The first FTL drive was completed in 2100 and made it's maiden voyage onboard the SDCX Escapade, the first Sol Defence Corps ship capable of travelling not only at the speed of light, but faster. After the Escapade's successful tests and retirement, the Alcubierre FTL drive was employed on numerous starships within the SDC including the Escapade's successors, the Endurant and the Emissary. Though the fastest models of FTL drive are in widespread use by the Sol Defence Corps, such drives are not employed by civilian spacecraft, which are limited to lower-speed FTL drives or Near-Lightspeed drives, and unauthorized manufacturing of FTL drives is strictly illegal.
Operation
See: Guide to Engineering
FTL drives come in three main types, separated mainly by their method of power acquisition and power consumption:
- Standard Model Alcubierre Faster-Than-Light Travel System (FTL-TS) - The Standard Model FTL Drive is the most commonly used model of drive employed in civilian spacecraft, and a number of smaller Sol Defence Corps vessels with a maximum operating speed of 90c (90 times the speed of light) but a standard operating speed of 40c. The Standard Model's decreases in space requirements and typical thruster maintenance costs makes it extremely favorable to all civilian liners and is present in nearly every model of corporate spacecraft. However, Standard Model drives are not equipped with Dark Matter Handling systems and as such require periodic refueling, which itself is exceptionally expensive.
- Self-Sufficient Alcubierre Faster-Than-Light Travel Systems (S-FTL-TS) - The Self-Sufficient Model FTL drive is the most powerful model of Alcubierre faster-than-light drives, capable of flying at a maximum of 350c with a standard operating speed of 150-250c. Self-Sufficient FTL drives are equipped with Dark Matter Handling Systems which acquire dark matter and normal matter (typically hydrogen or a repository of other elements) from space surrounding the equipped spacecraft, making the DMHS' fuel source practically infinite, requiring only reactor power in order to operate the system. Self-Sufficient FTL drives are employed exclusively by the Sol Defence Corps and often installed on large spacecraft, warships and exploration vessels.
- Near Lightspeed Travel System (NLS-TS) - The Near Lightspeed Drive is the weakest model of Alcubierre faster-than-light drive, unable to break the 1c barrier due to a small design. While unable to travel between star systems, they do far outpace the speed of previous propulsion models such as nuclear fusion engines and antimatter-matter annihilation engines and can travel from Earth to Jupiter in under 40 minutes, beaten only by the Standard Model's instant speed. Near Lightspeed drives are typically installed on shuttles and fighters.
An Alcubierre faster-than-light travel system is comprised of 7 parts. The drive does not possess it's own battery array and feeds directly from the reactor of a ship.
| Component Name | Internal/External | Description |
| Matter Repositories | Internal | A set of large tanks containing dark matter and normal matter encased in an additional shell to keep the interior tank chilled, with the dark matter tanks surrounded by rings of electromagnetic coils on the outside. The interior tank is kept in a state of near-absolute vacuum surrounded by a chilled exterior to keep the matter inside in a constant, unchanged state so it may be used for the refinery process. Dark matter and normal matter (usually in the form of hydrogen) are either manually inserted into the repository tanks on routine refills, or can be kept topped off with the use of ramscoops on self-sufficient models. Only dark matter tanks require an array of electromagnetic coils on the outside. |
| Catalyst Repositories | Smaller and fewer repositories of catalyst materials. The most commonly used catalysts are antimatter and astatine, which are introduced into the refinery unit alongside dark matter and normal matter. They are required in far less concentration than the other components of the process and therefore their units are much smaller. On self-sufficient drives, the repositories for catalyst are much larger and more numerous as astatine and dark matter cannot be as easily procured as dark matter and normal matter. | |
| Transit Tubes | The contents of the tanks are transferred between ramscoops and refinery tanks using a slight difference in pressure within the transit tubes. These feed dark matter and normal matter from their repositories to the main refinery unit, and feed matter either from the outside of the ship via ramscoops or into the tanks via fuelling modules. | |
| Pressure Tanks | A set of large tanks full of air that is used to pressurise the interior of the Refinery Unit. | |
| Refinery Unit | The central unit of the drive, and most commonly referred to as the drive itself. A large, spherical chamber with structural supports surrounding it alongside a large array of electromagnetic coils and multiple transit tubes to feed in dark matter, normal matter and catalyst. The transit tubes feed into airlocks which store a certain volume of each type of matter at a time, introducing precise amounts of each into the main refinery unit one after the other before letting in the next batch, creating exotic matter via the interaction of the different types of matter in the refinery unit under the pressure and conditions within the sphere.
When exotic matter is successfully created, it must be immediately jettisoned outside of the ship to create a warp bubble through the ship's exotic matter emitters, or to get rid of it for any other reason, and cannot be stored. Afterwards, the refinery chamber is repressurised and prepared for another batch. | |
| Ramscoops | External | An array of intakes on the outer hull of a ship which uses magnetism and ramscooping to pull in hydrogen and dark matter from surrounding space. Matter captured by ramscoops is separated into dark matter, normal matter and unwanted matter, which are then sealed inside airlocks and then fed into the repositories, while any unwanted material is jettisoned back out. Ramscoops are not as efficient as routine refuelling, but perform well in creating a self-sufficient drive for long distances. |
| Exotic Matter Emitters | Also known as just emitters or EMEs, exotic matter emitters are small ventilation chutes which release exotic matter as they are fed through the emission system from the refinery unit and out into space surrounding the ship. Using a constant and equal emission, the tachyon-type exotic matter will naturally take the form of a warp bubble and will only begin to move an instance of space once it has created an enclosed warp bubble.
Exotic matter emitters must be constantly outputting exotic matter for the entire duration of a transit, though by heightening the volume of refinery, a ship is able to release the strain on the drive's systems by intermittently giving it rest by giving the warp bubble an extra amount of exotic matter for it to eventually waste. |
Dark Matter Handling System
Dark Matter Handling Systems are present on every ship used in extrasolar travel for it's ability to cover far distances that would typically use up an entire exotic matter fuel source by utilizing a completely self-sufficient system. Dark Matter Handling Systems are connected to 2 sets of ramscoop intakes on the sides of a ship which collect dark matter and normal matter, respectively, a catalyst repository, a supply of certain types of normal matter (such as astatine) and antimatter, which allow for interface between dark matter and the primary source of normal matter, and a power source to operate the handling system, typically the main reactor of a ship. Models that are not self sufficient simply replenish their dark matter and normal matter routinely.
Exotic matter is refined through the combination of dark matter and normal matter in a one-way path leading to the exotic matter repository of the ship. Within the Dark Matter Handling System, normal and dark matter are enabled to interact by use of catalysts, which causes the refinery process to occur - normal and dark matter begin to neutralize each other which produces exotic matter. The dark matter repository is lined with electromagnets to prevent unstable dark matter from becoming too unstable to be refined. This is a precautionary measure, as unstable dark matter must pass a certain threshold in order to become too unstable to refine - it is otherwise safe to use in the refinery process, and as such, the electromagnets can be shut off in emergency situations or turned on before other systems in the event of a shutdown. Exotic matter produced in the refinery process is rarely incompatible with the FTL drive and, in these rare cases, is usually disposed of by use of jettison.
The ideal product of exotic matter refinery is Tachyon-type exotic matter, which has negative mass, always travels faster than the speed of light - rendering it invisible, acts parallel to force acting upon it, but still hosts the primary attribute of exotic matter, being that it interacts with normal matter. This exotic matter is stored in it's own large repository and is used in the transit process.
Transit Process
The transit process occurs within a Physical Alcubierre Metric, often abbreviated to PAM and also known colloquially as a warp bubble. 'Physical Alcubierre Metric' is named for the Alcubierre metric which FTL drives operate under. Prior to the transit process, a ship's crew must fill out astrogational parametres as a ship will collide with any other matter which enters the warp bubble during the transit process. Once astrogational parametres have been set, exotic matter is transferred from their repositories to Exotic Matter Emitters, which allow exotic matter to surround the ship and form an oblate exotic matter warp bubble.
A warp bubble's size is dependent of the amount of exotic matter emitted - larger self-sufficient vessels will have a larger DMHS to accommodate for a larger bubble, and vice versa - and after it has been emitted, will begin to manipulate spacetime through folding. The warp bubble exhibits two opposite behaviours on either side of the bubble which allow it to move. On one pole of the bubble, space will contract and pull the isolated warp bubble forward. This contraction causes an opposite reaction on the other pole of the bubble, where the contracted space will return and cause space to expand behind the bubble, causing motion. As long as more exotic matter is emitted, the process perpetuates and will continue until the supply is cut off or runs out. By removing and adding space at either ends of the bubble, the space within the bubble changes position but does not necessarily move - the object is not accelerating, but the space it occupies is being forced to move by the manipulation of spacetime via exotic matter. Being that it's change in position acts independently of mass and acceleration as a result of tachyon-type exotic matter, it occurs faster than the speed of light, enabling FTL travel. Any objects within the warp bubble do not experience acceleration or any otherwise effects as the transit process occurs, including time dilation. Interaction with light is also not affected, as objects within the bubble are not locally moving faster than light.
History
Faster than light travel as harnessed by humanity has been conceptualized for centuries prior to the Space Age, with much of it's roots in science fiction. Faster than light things do exist in the world, such as daily sky motion, closing and proper speeds, and other non-informational processes moving faster than light. Faster than light travel as harnessed by humanity, in order to reach distant stars in an instant, was vehemently rejected, as at the time there was no present method of interfacing with dark matter - let alone harnessing it. Nevertheless, theoretical physicist Miguel Alcubierre conceptualised a potential faster-than-light drive in 1994 with an early concept of exotic matter, which based on the nature of tachyons, turned out to be an accurate depiction of exotic matter nearly 110 years later. This concept remained limited to science fiction but did not quite die out as an idea for many years. The beginning of the Space Age in 2050 hosted interplanetary flight below the speed of light, which would set forth the objective for humanity to harness FTL travel.
Three major events went into the discovery of FTL: the advancement and studies of the Stawell Underground Research Facility, the construction of the Circumsolar Particle Accelerator, and the Astatine Rush on Neptune.
The Stawell Underground Research Facility is a large, still operating underground research facility in Victoria, Australia. The successor to the Stawell Underground Physics Laboratory opened in 2022, The lab's primary objective was the study of dark matter, and as the gold mine it was surrounded by was ran dry, the physics laboratory was allowed to expand with a heightened budget from the Australian government - the technological speedup around the world led to the Australian government wanting to keep up with the rest of the first world and, as such, put more funding into science, with the opportunity to pioneer dark matter studies not to be wasted, as the Stawell Underground Physics Lab had one of the most effective and forefront dark matter detectors in the world. Over time, the laboratory had grown in size, funds and employees, eventually evolving into the Stawell Underground Research Facility. It's ability to study dark matter was increased as not only by the facility's expansion, but also the accelerated pace of technology which brought dark matter detection equipment to new heights.
In 2039, the research facility was able to verify the existence of dark matter in the universe. As the Stawell Facility discovered dark matter, their findings enabled numerous other facilities around the world to upgrade their equipment and also discover, and verify, the existence of dark matter. Not long after, the Naval Development Group within the newly founded Sol Defence Corps put forth a project to send out starships hosting both advanced dark matter detection equipment and the earliest versions of the exterior dark matter intakes to attempt to collect and store dark matter. The project lasted for several months before the experimental starship was able to collect one tank of dark matter stabilized by electromagnets. This process was repeated two more times the following years and allowed for the extremely fast development of dark matter detection, intake and storage technology. However, little was known what dark matter could do, and what to do with it.
In 2071, construction of the Circumsolar Particle Accelerator (abbreviated to CPA), developed by multiple organizations under joint-operation with the Naval Development Group was officially concluded. The Circumsolar Particle Accelerator took the form of a series of rings, hundreds of kilometres apart, forming a loop around Sol which reached as far the Earth-Mars Lagrange point. These rings allowed for the largest, most advanced particle accelerator tests known to man and were capable of testing close to the highest unknowns of physics. Namely, the CPA was capable of producing two things: microscopic black holes, and large amounts of antimatter. The microscopic black holes produced by the particle accelerator were weak and would quickly dissolve, and though it is theoretically possible to isolate a black hole and allow it to grow by separating it from the loop of the CPA, such tests have not been conducted. On the other hand, the CPA is capable of producing macroscopic amounts of antimatter - and though it is possible to collect enough antimatter to produce some of the most powerful weapons in Sol, the amount of antimatter that one must collect to create a large enough warhead to do damage has a massive energy cost and would take a long duration to collect from the CPA. A small amount of antimatter warheads have been created, and an even smaller amount of experimental antimatter weapons have been constructed using antimatter obtained from the CPA.
Alternatively, the heightened rate of antimatter collection was enough to unlock yet another step in dark matter refinery, as antimatter was an important catalyst in Dark Matter Handling Systems which were in early drafting phases by the time of the CPA's construction. The capacity for tachyon-type exotic matter was discovered some time after the initial dark matter collection projects had concluded, and with it's capacity to unlock faster-than-light travel, the Naval Development Group was granted billions of credits in funding for the Dark Matter Handling project. Despite the advancements they had made with the antimatter gained from the CPA, the NDG still did not have access to what they deemed the most suitable and efficient catalyst for dark matter refinery: astatine, one of the rarest metals known to man.
The 2089 Neptune survey revealed the last step in the FTL puzzle: a plentiful source of astatine. Hidden beneath Neptune's primarily hydrogen and methane atmosphere was rich amounts of astatine. This was discovered by Naval Development Group scientists working out of Saturn, and as such, the SDC were the first ones to learn about astatine on Neptune. Until now, the SDC was struggling to keep complete control on FTL drive development - the Circumsolar Particle Accelerator was used by many different scientific and corporate entities, numerous different institutions were capable of capturing and storing dark matter, and all eyes were on the development of the NDG's Dark Matter Handling System. If just anyone was allowed to harvest astatine from Neptune, there would be completely unregulated development of faster-than-light travel, which the SDC deemed unacceptable. As such, after SDCSS Atlantis was constructed in Neptunian orbit, a blockade was placed on the planet, preventing mining prospectors or otherwise competitors from profiting off of or obtaining astatine. Additionally, the SDC worked with the UN to begin to more strictly regulate the use of the Circumsolar Particle Accelerator, restricting it's use to that of the NDG and a select number of institutions that could then pass on their research to other groups. Dark matter studies were not largely affected by revisions.
With the blockade and revisions in place, the SDC and the NDG had successfully gained complete control over FTL development and, with their huge repository of astatine, were able to complete the Dark Matter Handling system the following year in 2100, officially announcing the completion of the DMHS and the very first Alcubierre faster-than-light travel system with the maiden voyage of the Escapade. The blockade on Neptune was lifted in 2106 as a combination of mining permits and laws restricting unauthorized FTL development kept the SDC on top of the game in faster-than-light travel. In 2109, the first Standard Model FTL drive was released to the public which relied on external dark matter refinery for fuel, but possessed exotic matter emitters and were therefore capable of breaking the 1c barrier. This technology became extremely widespread - nearly every ship was equipped with a Standard Model FTL drive, even if their model did not accommodate for it, and numerous civilian dark matter refineries and refuel posts were established on Luna, Mars and Jupiter. Faster-than-light travel also enabled the true beginning of the Final Frontier Project as FTL travel led to the quick colonisation of the exoplanets of Ballad, Homestead and Avalon.