This Star Trek concept ignited a dream that humans could one day travel faster than the speed of light. Now physicists are working to make it so.

《星际迷航》中的这个概念点燃了人们一个梦想：人类有朝一日能以超光速飞行。现在，物理学家们正致力于让这个梦想成为现实。

Nearly 60 years ago, the original Star Trek series ignited a dream in the public’s imagination: that one day, people would travel the galaxy in ships propelled by faster-than-light “warp drives.”

差不多60年前，原版《星际迷航》系列剧在公众的想象中点燃了一个梦想：有朝一日，人们可以乘坐由超光速“曲速引擎”（warp drives）驱动的飞船，在银河系中穿梭旅行。

The idea that future humans could hop in a vessel and arrive at a distant star system that afternoon soon became a staple of science fiction, not just in Star Trek but in dozens of other movies, TV shows, and books beloved by generations of fans.

未来人类能够乘坐飞船，在当天下午就抵达遥远恒星系统的设想，很快就成为了科幻作品中的一个经典设定。它不仅出现在《星际迷航》中，也出现在其他数十部深受几代粉丝喜爱的电影、电视剧和书籍里。

Many of those fans were children who would grow up to become scientists. And today, some of those scientists are bending spacetime itself to bring warp drive closer to reality.

这些粉丝中的许多人，长大后成为了科学家。而如今，这些科学家中的一些人，正在亲手扭曲时空本身，致力于将曲速驱动变为现实。

For decades, most physicists considered warp drive to be impossible. But in the past few years, theoretical research has suggested that the fictional technology does not necessarily violate any laws of physics—a discovery that has ignited a wave of interest in creating real warp drive technology.

几十年来，大多数物理学家都认为曲速驱动是不可能实现的。但在过去几年里，理论研究表明，这种科幻技术并不一定违反任何物理定律——这一发现激起了人们对创造真正的曲速驱动技术的极大兴趣。

And while there are still many practical challenges to work out—in particular, how to generate and harness the immense energy needed—some physicists say it’s not outside the realm of possibility.

尽管仍有许多实际挑战需要解决——尤其是如何产生和利用所需的巨大能量——但一些物理学家表示，这并非不可能。

“It’s amazing how science fiction writers imagine things, and we then figure out they can work,” says Alexey Bobrick, an astrophysicist and pioneering warp drive researcher at Applied Physics, a public benefit company that works with governments and the private sector. “It’s really quite beautiful.”

“科幻作家们能想象出各种事物，而我们随后发现它们是可行的，这真令人惊叹。”天体物理学家兼曲速引擎（warp drive）领域的先驱研究员亚历克西·鲍布里克（Alexey Bobrick）说道，他供职于Applied Physics公司——一家与政府和私营部门合作的公益公司。“这着实令人着迷。”

FROM SCI-FI TO THEORETICAL PHYSICS

从科幻到理论物理

There’s a reason physicists like Bobrick are taking warp drive seriously: The concept isn’t actually that far-fetched. Compared with other sci-fi ideas for moving faster-than-light, like wormholes and extradimensional hyperdrives, warp drive is “the easiest to make compatible with known physics,” says physicist and science communicator Sabine Hossenfelder, who regularly shares new warp drive research on her popular YouTube channel.

鲍勃里克（Bobrick）等物理学家认真对待曲速驱动（warp drive）并非没有原因：这个概念实际上并没有那么牵强。物理学家兼科普传播者萨宾·霍森费尔德（Sabine Hossenfelder）表示，与科幻作品中其他超光速旅行的概念，例如虫洞（wormholes）和超维度超驱动（extradimensional hyperdrives）相比，曲速驱动是“最容易与已知物理学相兼容的”，她经常在自己受欢迎的YouTube频道上分享关于曲速驱动的新研究。

In science fiction, a warp drive is a propulsion system that creates a bubble of spacetime around a spaceship. That bubble is then accelerated to move faster than the speed of light. Taken at face value, this may sound impossible: After all, according to Einstein’s theory of relativity, objects in our universe cannot be accelerated beyond the lightspeed barrier.

在科幻小说中，曲速引擎是一种能在宇宙飞船周围制造一个时空泡的推进系统。这个时空泡随后会被加速，以超越光速的速度移动。从表面上看，这听起来可能不可思议：毕竟，根据爱因斯坦的相对论，我们宇宙中的任何物体都无法被加速到突破光速的限制。

But spacetime itself can bend or warp at any speed.

但时空本身却能以任何速度弯曲或扭曲。

Star Trek science advisor and astrophysicist Erin MacDonald says it’s useful to think of spacetime as a fabric within which objects—from stars to spaceships—are embedded. “If you wrap your ship in the fabric of spacetime and then that fabric goes faster than light, carrying you with it, that's actually not breaking any laws of physics,” says MacDonald.

《星际迷航》的科学顾问兼天体物理学家艾琳·麦克唐纳（Erin MacDonald）表示，将时空想象成一块布料很有用，所有物体——从恒星到宇宙飞船——都嵌入其中。麦克唐纳说：“如果你把飞船包裹在时空的布料中，然后这块布料以超光速移动，带着你一起前进，这实际上并没有违反任何物理定律。”

This concept had existed in science fiction literature before Star Trek made its debut.It’s not surprising thatStar Trekcreator Gene Roddenberrychose to adopt warp drive versus a more fantastical flavor of faster-than-light travel, according to author and Star Trek historian Ryan Britt. Roddenberry “was obsessed with fact-checking as much as he could,” Britt says. “That wasn’t something that existed in science fiction television ever before.”

这个概念在《星际迷航》首次亮相之前，就已经存在于科幻文学作品中。据作家兼《星际迷航》历史学家瑞安·布里特（Ryan Britt）所说，因此，《星际迷航》的创作者吉恩·罗登贝里（Gene Roddenberry）选择采用曲速驱动，而非其他更具奇幻色彩的超光速旅行方式，这并不令人惊讶。布里特表示，罗登贝里“尽可能地痴迷于事实核查”。他说，“这在以往的科幻电视中是前所未有的。”

But as plausible asthe general concept may have been, warp drive was still seen as purely fictional. The problem, MacDonald explains, is that distorting spacetime in this manner would take a mind-boggling amount of energy.

尽管这个总体概念看似合理，但曲速驱动仍然被认为是纯粹的虚构。MacDonald 解释说，问题在于以这种方式扭曲时空将需要消耗难以置信的巨大能量。

In a seminal 1994 paper on warp drive—considered the first serious scientific look at how it might work—physicist Miguel Alcubierre devised a mathematical model that would contract spacetime in front of a ship and expand it behind the ship. While the so-called Alcubierre drive could move a bubble of spacetime at any speed, he found that generating a bubble even as small as a few meters in diameter would require an amount of energy comparable to the mass of the sun.

在1994年一篇关于曲速驱动的开创性论文中——这被认为是首次对曲速驱动的工作原理进行严肃的科学探讨——物理学家米格尔·阿尔库维尔（Miguel Alcubierre）提出了一种数学模型，该模型能让飞船前方的时空收缩，后方的时空扩张。尽管这种被称为“阿尔库维尔驱动”（Alcubierre drive）的技术能够以任意速度移动一个时空泡，但阿尔库维尔发现，即使是生成一个直径仅有几米的时空泡，也需要相当于太阳质量的巨大能量。

Furthermore, Alcubierre’s calculations required the existence of an exotic form of “negative energy” to make the drive compatible with Einstein’s theory of relativity. Unfortunately, negative energy appears to be a purely mathematical concept and “not something that seems to exist” in our universe, Hossenfelder says.

此外，阿尔库比耶（Alcubierre）的计算要求必须存在一种奇特的“负能量”，才能使他设想的曲速驱动器与爱因斯坦的相对论相兼容。然而，霍森费尔德（Hossenfelder）指出，负能量似乎纯粹是一个数学概念，在我们的宇宙中“并不真实存在”。

FROM THEORETICAL TO PHYSICAL WARP DRIVES

从理论走向物理曲速引擎

In the years following Alcubierre’s paper, other researchers, including those at NASA, tinkered with his model. Many follow-up papers attempted to reduce the negative energy requirements.

在阿尔库别雷的论文发表后的几年里，包括美国宇航局（NASA）的科学家在内的其他研究人员对他的模型进行了改进。许多后续论文都试图减少（该模型对）负能量的需求。

Bobrick first learned about warp drive while studying general relativity in college. He found it intriguing. “It sat in the back of my mind for a long, long time,” he says.

鲍勃里克在大学学习广义相对论时，首次接触到了曲速驱动。他觉得这个概念引人入胜。“这个想法在我脑海里盘桓了很久很久。”他说。

When Bobrick met Applied Physics co-founder Gianni Martire and learned of his interest in the topic, the pair decided to investigate warp drive more closely.

当鲍勃里克（Bobrick）遇到“应用物理”（Applied Physics）公司的联合创始人詹尼·马蒂尔（Gianni Martire），并了解到他对这个话题的兴趣后，两人决定更深入地研究曲速驱动。

Instead of tinkering with the Alcubierre drive, the pair decided to start from scratch and see if they could construct a new, more physical, model. They started simple, restricting their analysis to warp drives moving at constant speeds. (Alcubierre’s drive could accelerate or decelerate, which is more mathematically complicated to describe.)

两人没有在阿尔库比亚引擎（Alcubierre drive）上修修补补，而是决定从零开始，看看他们能否构建一个全新的、更符合物理实际的模型。他们从简单的假设入手，将分析限制在以恒定速度运行的曲速引擎上。（阿尔库比亚引擎可以加速或减速，这在数学上描述起来更为复杂。）

In 2021, Bobrick and Martire published a paper in the journal Classical and Quantum Gravity titled “Introducing Physical Warp Drives.” In it, they describe the general geometry of a warp bubble with an inner passenger area where spacetime is flat, surrounded by a curved, outer wall that exerts a gravitational field. This stood in contrast to Alcubierre’s warp bubble, which does not gravitationally tug on objects outside of it—part of what Bobrick says makes it unphysical.

2021年，Bobrick 和 Martire 在《经典与量子引力》（Classical and Quantum Gravity）期刊上发表了一篇题为“引入物理曲速驱动”（Introducing Physical Warp Drives）的论文。在这篇论文中，他们描述了一种曲速泡（warp bubble）的整体几何结构：内部是一个时空平坦（spacetime is flat）的乘客区域，外部则被一个弯曲的壁（curved, outer wall）环绕，这个外壁会产生一个引力场（gravitational field）。这与阿尔库比耶雷（Alcubierre）的曲速泡形成了对比，后者不会对其外部物体产生引力牵引——Bobrick 认为，这正是其“非物理性”（unphysical）的一部分。

Their model does not require negative energy—however it would still take several Jupiter-sized objects’ worth of energy to move a bubble several meters across, Bobrick says, “which is prohibitively too much.”

Bobrick表示，他们的模型不需要负能量——然而，要移动一个直径数米的泡泡，仍然需要相当于数个木星大小物体所蕴含的能量，“这简直多得令人望而却步。”

Yet the bigger caveat of Bobrick and Martire’s warp bubble is that it can only move slower than the speed of light. This may come as a disappointment to Star Trek fans, but physicists say it’s still an important step toward moving warp technology out of the realm of science fiction.

然而，Bobrick和Martire的曲速泡模型最大的不足在于，它只能以低于光速的速度移动。这可能会让《星际迷航》（Star Trek）的粉丝们感到失望，但物理学家们表示，这仍然是将曲速技术从科幻领域推向现实的重要一步。

“Now we have a much better mathematical basis to study warp drives,” Hossenfelder said in a video published when the paper first came out. “We know what the warped spacetime looks like.”

“现在我们有了研究曲速驱动更好的数学基础了，”霍森菲尔德（Hossenfelder）在该论文首次发表时发布的一段视频中说道，“我们知道弯曲时空的样子了。”

ENGAGE! MAKING WARP DRIVE A REALITY

启动！让曲速引擎变为现实

Now that scientists have a more realistic model of a warp bubble, the key question becomes finding a way to change its speed. After all, in a hypothetical future where warp drive is used for space travel, bubbles will need to speed up, slow down, and come to a stop to let passengers on and off a ship. “Describing that whole process is quite crucial,” Bobrick says.

鉴于科学家们现在已经有了一个更真实的曲率泡模型，关键问题就变成了如何找到改变其速度的方法。毕竟，在一个假设的未来，如果曲率驱动技术被用于太空旅行，曲率泡将需要加速、减速并最终停下来，以便乘客上下飞船。“描述整个过程至关重要，”Bobrick说。

More theoretical work is also needed to reduce warp drive’s energy needs. Even with a hypothetical, futuristic energy source like cold fusion on hand, producing several planets’ worth of energy is likely unfeasible.

更多的理论研究也有待进行，以降低曲速驱动的能量需求。即使将来有冷聚变（cold fusion）这样假想的先进能源可用，要产生相当于数个行星的能量也几乎是不可能实现的。

While there’s a lot left to do to prove warp drive is even theoretically achievable, Bobrick says that the field of warp drive has seen “quite a lot of fresh thinking” over the past few years. Indeed, his 2021 paper has been cited over 60 times, including by warp drive researchers in Canada, Argentina, Europe, and New Zealand. (It has even attracted some critics—a sign at very least that he’s not alone in taking the subject seriously.)

尽管在证明曲速驱动（warp drive）在理论上是可行的方面仍有许多工作要做，但Bobrick表示，在过去几年里，曲速驱动领域已经出现了“许多新颖的思维”。事实上，他2021年的论文已被引用了60多次，引用者包括来自加拿大、阿根廷、欧洲和新西兰的曲速驱动研究人员。（它甚至吸引了一些批评者——这至少表明他并非唯一认真对待这个课题的人。）

And while it may be several lifetimes before humans travel the stars using warp drive, it’s conceivable that we could get our first glimpse of a warp-capable starship much sooner. In 2024, a group of physicists published a paper describing how the collapse of a warp bubble—a warp core breach for the Star Trek fans—would send ripples, or gravitational waves, through the fabric of spacetime. These ripples could be picked up on Earth using a detector tuned to the right frequency. The notion that we might get a glimpse of other warp-capable species as a result of such interstellar disasters is “objectively awesome,” MacDonald says.

尽管人类可能还需要几代人的时间才能利用曲速驱动实现星际旅行，但我们很有可能在更早的时候首次瞥见能够进行曲速飞行的星舰。2024年，一群物理学家发表了一篇论文，描述了曲速泡的坍缩——对于《星际迷航》的粉丝来说，这就像是“曲速核心破裂”——将如何在时空结构中激发出涟漪，也就是引力波。这些涟漪可以使用一个调整到正确频率的探测器在地球上被接收到。麦克唐纳（MacDonald）说，这种想法——我们可能会因为此类星际灾难而瞥见其他拥有曲速飞行能力的物种——是“客观上令人惊叹的”。

The research, MacDonald adds, underscores the fact that we are still learning basic things about our universe. It was only a decade ago that scientists confirmed the existence of gravitational waves, caused by colliding black holes and other incredibly energetic events, a discovery that proved beyond the shadow of a doubt that spacetime is being warped constantly.

麦克唐纳补充说，这项研究强调了我们仍在学习关于宇宙的基本知识。仅仅十年前，科学家才证实了引力波的存在，引力波是由黑洞碰撞和其他极高能量事件引起的，这一发现毫无疑问地证明了时空一直在不断地扭曲。

“And so, the next logical step in science is to now learn how to play with it,” MacDonald says.

“因此，科学的下一个合乎逻辑的步骤，就是学习如何驾驭它。”麦克唐纳说。