How far off is faster-than-light travel? Many people think it's impossible, but these NASA scientists have been working on it:
http://www.scmp.com/news/world/article/ ... ise-courseAn oversimplified explanation is that the concept seeks to exploit a "loophole" in Albert Einstein's theory of relativity, a loophole that allows travel faster than the speed of light by expanding space-time behind the object and contracting space-time in front of it.
The online publication Io9 explains the concept more fully: "Essentially, the empty space behind a starship would be made to expand rapidly, pushing the craft in a forward direction - passengers would perceive it as movement despite the complete lack of acceleration."
White, whose job title is "advanced propulsion theme lead for the Nasa Engineering Directorate", has calculated a plausible way to accomplish this using far less energy than required by the original theory proposed in 1994 by physicist Miguel Alcubierre.
