After some lull, news of the "impossible electromagnetic motor" returns. Researchers from the Chinese space agency have released a video via local news agencies showing an allegedly functioning EM Drive. Have the Chinese really managed to create the impossible? Let us not jump to conclusions, at least as soon as China did.
First, let's remember what we know about EM Drive at the moment. Prior to the above news from China, the media reported at least two supposedly breakthrough developments related to the creation of an electromagnetic motor. One source was the aerospace agency NASA, which published a review of the work claiming that the electromagnetic engine does work, at least in theory.
The findings, of course, have been subject to a certain amount of skepticism from some experts and, at best, have been perceived as ambiguous and contradictory. Why so, we will analyze below. This was followed by news from China, in which it was stated that experts had proven the operation of the EM Drive and at the moment they began testing one of them. In the latest video published, it is said that the results of these tests were successful.
EM Drive design
What is EM Drive? Also known as an accelerating field RF resonator, the EM Drive is supposedly capable of generating thrust without using any type of fuel. This electromagnetic thrust is created by microwaves hitting the walls of a special chamber. In addition, the overall momentum generated by the EM Drive is expected to continually increase with its motion, which in theory would allow the spacecraft to reach very high speeds.
The interest in this technology is understandable. Indeed, in the long term, this can open the way to cheap space flights, as well as faster space travel. However, there is one "but". Physics, according to which this EM Drive works, contradicts Newton's third law of motion - for each action there is an equivalent and reverse reaction, which in our case cannot be created in space without fuel.
“The action and the reaction to this action is a direct result of the conservation of momentum,” says Bryce Cassenti, an expert in the development of advanced propulsion systems at the University of Connecticut.
"Violation of such a fundamental law as conservation of momentum will lead to the deprivation of much of the basis for all the physics that we know."
Promotional video:
Despite all our desire for a device that can revolutionize space travel and allow us to get to Mars and beyond much faster than is possible now, it is unlikely that this device will be exactly an electromagnetic engine. And there will not be such a device as a warp drive, as some media have mistakenly adopted EM Drive. Warp Drive and EM Drive are completely different things.
Unfortunately, so far the warp drive remains possible only in the realities of science fiction, allowing you to travel through space faster than the speed of light by bending around the fabric of space-time.
"The foundational base of all scientific knowledge tells us that this is impossible, especially given Einstein's theory of relativity," comments NASA.
Without the presence of EM Drive and the obvious impossibility, at least in the near (and most likely in the distant) future, to create a warp drive, the only thing we have to rely on is conservative propulsive jet technologies. They are most likely to allow a person to get to Mars and beyond. To do this, experts say, you just need to start creating large, really large rockets with very powerful propulsion systems. And this is just now being done by NASA and private companies such as SpaceX, which promises that its Interplanetary Transport System rocket will be able to deliver people to Mars in just 80 days. And according to the head of the company, Elon Musk, jet technologies still have a large reserve of potential. Having realized it,it will be possible to reduce the flight time to our planetary neighbor to just 30 days.
It may not look faster than light, or at least as fast as EM Drive is credited with, but it is a more realistic option, which also does not contradict the fundamental laws of physics.
Nikolay Khizhnyak