From: mike99@lascruces.com
Date: Wed Apr 12 2000 - 20:40:06 MDT
A Russian scientist claims to have discovered a theoretical type of
wormhole that would be self-stabilizing without the need for input of
"negative energy."
Go to the end of this posting for a link to the original paper in English
translation.
Mike LaTorra
mike99@lascruces.com
>Voyages across the Universe have come light years closer
>
>FASTEN your seatbelts and hold on tight-intergalactic space travel is
>back on the agenda. Sceptics who dismiss the idea of faster-than-light
>travel through "wormholes" in space may have to think again, because
>new calculations based on Einstein's general theory of relativity suggest
>that wormholes large and stable enough to allow intergalactic travel really
>can exist.
>The possibility that the cosmos is peppered with short cuts through space
>and time has intrigued people ever since 1915 when German theorist Ludwig
>Flamm found hints of their existence in Einstein's equations. While attempts
>to unify the fundamental forces of nature suggest that tiny quantum
>wormholes may exist, most experts suspect that some fundamental law of
>physics prevents the formation of large wormholes-not least because these
>would theoretically allow time travellers to go back in time and, say,
>prevent their own birth by accidentally killing one of their parents.
>Now a Russian theorist has found a new type of wormhole that is
>compatible with the known laws of physics, yet can be as big and stable
>as you like. According to Sergei Krasnikov, a relativity expert at the
>Pulkovo Observatory in St Petersburg, the standard arguments against
>large wormholes assume that they all have the same basic shape, and need to
>be crammed with "exotic matter" to keep them open (New Scientist, 6
>September 1997, p 49).
>Such exotic matter has never been seen, but theory suggests it can be
>created literally out of nothing when space and time are curved in the
>right way. What Krasnikov has found is a new type of wormhole that can
>create its own supply of exotic matter-and in sufficient quantities to make
>it big enough and keep it open long enough for people to use.
>"This new wormhole, like every other, needs exotic matter for it to form,
>and like some others can produce it by itself," Krasnikov told New
>Scientist. "What's new is that this wormhole actually generates enough
>to make it arbitrarily large." Other theorists admit to being intrigued by
>the new work, but remain cautious.
>"It's worth taking seriously," says Ian Moss, a relativity expert at the
>University of Newcastle upon Tyne. "The main worry is that it could fall
>down on some technical detail." Paul Davies of Imperial College, London,
>adds that proving something is theoretically possible does not prove it
>actually exists: "My feeling is that the matter is still open," he says.
>Krasnikov accepts that testing his claims by building a wormhole is far
>beyond present technology. Even so, such wormholes may have been
>left over from the big bang, he says-and finding one would have a
>dramatic effect on interstellar travel: "If there is a wormhole connecting
>the vicinities of the Earth and the star Vega, one can take a short cut by
>flying through it."
>Source: http://xxx.lanl.gov/ (archive gr-qc, abstract 0003092, title
>"Toward a Traversable Wormhole")
>
>
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