The hypothesis about, which does not need fuel, was put forward by NASA some time ago. But the space agency was unable to create a working version of such a device. But the Chinese probably succeeded - although the technical characteristics of the device are not reported.
EmDrive contains a magnetron, which generates microwaves, and a resonator, which accumulates the energy of their vibrations. The unit can develop a thrust of 1.2 millinewtons per kilowatt when operating in a vacuum. The special feature of EmDrive is that it works without fuel. This reduces the weight of the unit and partially compensates for its power. The creation of such an engine could be a real breakthrough for all of humanity.
At the same time, it violates Newton's third law, which states that the action force must be equal to the reaction force. The fact that the engine does not use fuel can directly contradict the law of conservation of momentum: it creates a forward force without an equal and opposite force acting in the other direction.
What does this give to humanity?
If such an engine can actually become a reality, it could deliver a spacecraft to Mars in just 10 weeks, experts say. And, for example, current satellites can become half as large, since they will not have to carry fuel with them. People will also be able to travel further into space, obtaining fuel while moving along the way. But when the concept was first proposed, it was considered implausible because it clearly contradicts the laws of physics.
The Chinese are against physics
The Chinese television channel CCTV-2 reported on the planned testing by Chinese scientists of a working prototype of the EmDrive engine in space.
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Recently, the Eagleworks laboratory successfully conducted another test of the NASA-developed EmDrive engine, which heralded a real technological revolution. This project is often confused with the “hyperspace” or, as it is also called, the Cannes engine, supposedly capable of reaching the speed of light. Even though it does not have such fantastic abilities, the engine's performance iscontradicts the laws of physics , getting traction literally out of nothing. It goes without saying how much closer such an invention can bring humanity to a flight to Mars.
Construction of a spacecraft equipped with EmDrive for a flight to Mars
The prospect of equipping a spacecraft with an EmDrive engine literally excited the minds of the entire NASA organization. To successfully use the engine in space travel, it will need some kind of nuclear power plant with a capacity of 1 to 100 megawatts, the development technology of which has been collecting dust in NASA archives since the 80s. But now the dust has been blown off the plans, and the US Navy is already building a 220 MW reactor for its intercontinental ballistic missiles.
The head of the research group at Eagleworks, Harold White, shared his guess that a team of space travelers placed in a 2-megawatt nuclear electric rocket engine could reach Mars in just 70 days. This figure is possible due to the fact that NASA EM Drive is capable of creating thrust with a power of 0.4 Newton per kilowatt. If such an engine had been bolted to good old Apollo, it would have reached the Moon in just 3 days.
Heated discussions
The scientific community has greeted NASA's EM Drive project with a fair amount of skepticism, partly due to the fact that many reports have provided scant details about its operation. However, what made a lasting impression was that after the lasers were introduced into the resonance chamber, the speed of some of the beams located thereexceeded the speed of light. Surely, someone at that moment decided that NASA had accidentally created something like a spatial anomaly.
In fact, the EmDrive is more of a reactionary inertia drive than a hyperspace drive. It uses a powerful vacuum tube called a magnetron to direct microwaves into the closed end of a truncated cone located in a resonance chamber. But even describing the basics of how an engine works is hotly debated; and how can one even explain the fact that it violates Newton’s law of conservation of momentum? Since there is no known force producing thrust in the EM Drive, some believe it is due to an unexplored phenomenon or due to an error in the design of the resonance chamber motor.
One possible explanation for the Cannes engine's operation is that it "interacts with the quantum vacuum of a virtual plasma." Sounds like a bunch of words from “ Star Trek, right?
But still, in a nutshell: virtual particles appear as a result of fluctuations in the quantum vacuum, which is the lowest energy quantum state, after which they are ionized using microwaves. All this makes the principle of its operation similar to an ion engine, with the only difference being that EmDrive does not require ionized fuel.
However, some scientists are not satisfied with even this explanation, since they are of the opinion that the quantum vacuum cannot be ionized. According to the law of conservation of momentum, in order to create thrust, there must be something in the structure from which you can “push off”; but the quantum vacuum is presumably not capable of providing this necessary condition and is not even a plasma.
However, British scientist and inventor of EmDrive Roger Scheuer states that his device does not contradict Newton's laws.
“Simply put, electricity is converted into microwaves thanks to internal recesses, which is why it became possible to achieve this effect,” said Scheuer.
At the moment, engineers at the Eagleswork laboratory are trying to determine whether it will be possible to achieve outstanding results in the further development of the technology in the foreseeable future. It is worth mentioning here that in 2015, NASA already overcame one of the main obstacles to the full use of EmDrive for space flights, demonstrating its performance in a vacuum.
Scheuer's theory resonated in other countries. For example, last year, Chinese scientists provided their own evidence of the reliability of the operating principles of the new engine, creating a similar design, the thrust power of which, when using 2.5 kilowatts of energy, is 720 mN (millinewton). Researchers from Germany are also not far behind: in July 2015, they published data from their own experiments with EmDrive.
Recently, Paul Marsh, one of the NASA employees involved in the creation of EmDrive, published an unofficial update on the agency's forum, in which he suggested that a possible source of thrust in EmDrive is the Lorentz force, which determines the strength of the influence of the electromagnetic field (in this case, two) on point charged particle. The reason why this theory is valid is that the Earth's magnetic field can interact with the EmDrive's magnetic field and thus create infinite thrust, which, however, will be completely useless in outer space.
One way or another, the NASA team does not stop working to improve the technology. Who knows, maybe Mars is just the starting point of our future stellar journeys.
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In the near future, researchers from China plan to test the EmDrive engine, which, according to them, runs on microwave energy. The device is a metal truncated cone and a magnetron, which creates microwaves, the energy of which is accumulated by a resonator. In this case, the system is not exposed to external influences and uses electromagnetic fields to create thrust.
The creators of EmDrive refuse to disclose the technology. However, Finnish physicists believe that the engine operates based on the inertia of photons arising from the Unruh effect. This method allows you to get rid of heavy fuel containers and the use of jet emissions.
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It is noted that the idea of a device that contradicts the laws of physics was initially proposed by British engineer Roger Scheuer. He presented his project to the public in 2003, reports Gazeta.ru.
The creators of EmDrive hope to test the engine in space. They believe that using the device will reduce the flight to Mars to 10 weeks. And if the project is successful, it will allow reaching the edge of the solar system in a few months.
Full member of the Tsiolkovsky Russian Academy of Cosmonautics Alexander Zheleznyakov I don’t believe that such an engine is capable of working.
“I don’t comment on science fiction. You understand, it’s not at all clear what kind of engine this is. I am still a supporter of the idea that in nature nothing disappears without a trace and nothing appears without a trace. And then some fantastic ideas are expressed. Without knowing all the details, it is absurd to comment,” he said in an interview with NSN.
In turn, the head of the department of the Institute of Applied Mathematics named after M. V. Keldysh RAS, Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences Georgy Malinetsky noted that the EmDrive engine does not violate the laws of physics.
“When people imagine an engine, they imagine that something is moving, burning, but a lot has changed since the 19th century, when everything was exactly like that. Since then, people have created both quantum mechanics and quantum bullet theory. They found that a photon (a particle that has no rest mass) has both momentum and energy. Accordingly, attempts by scientists to use such things by converting electromagnetic field energy into motion energy are activities associated with the EmDrive engine. There are no violations of the laws of physics here, and then it depends on the engineers whether, based on the concepts of quantum field theory and quantum mechanics, they will be able to translate this into real structures,” he assured in a conversation with NSN.
The expert also noted that one can only be happy for the creators of such an engine and clarified, that previously the project of creating an “impossible” engine was seriously pursued at NASA. At the same time, the expert has not heard of anyone in Russia working on similar devices.
Malinetsky noted that this engine is of particular value for astronautics.
“For what we have on Earth, this engine is not needed. It is quite possible to drive on gasoline, gas, and electricity. But when it comes to space, in order for the satellite not to leave orbit, thrust is needed, albeit very small. What is most important is that this engine does not consume working fluid, it deals with the field, so it does not require rocket fuel to be carried into orbit. In this sense, this is an extremely tempting idea,” the expert noted.
Electromagnetic propulsion (EM propulsion) was first developed in 2001 by aerospace engineer Roger Schowyer, this technology can be thought of as a propulsion system that does not use fuel to cause propulsion. Removing the need for fuel makes the ship significantly lighter, and therefore easier to move (and cheaper to make, in theory). Additionally, the hypothetical drive would be capable of reaching extremely high speeds—we're talking about potentially propelling people toward the outer world of the solar system within months.
The problem is that the entire concept of reaction drive is inconsistent with Newton's conservation of momentum, which states that in a closed system, linear and angular momentum remain constant regardless of any changes occurring in said system. Simply put: if no external force is applied, the object will not move.
An EV engine lacks the response defined by Newton's third law: "For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction." But this contradicts our current fundamental understanding of physics: an action (the movement of a ship) that occurs without a reaction (ignition of fuel and displacement of mass) should be impossible. For this to happen, it would mean an as yet undefined phenomenon, or our understanding of physics is completely wrong.
How does an electric motor work?
Putting aside the potentially physically impossible capabilities of the technology, let's break down in simple terms how the proposed disk electromagnetic motor works. The EM motor is what is called an RF resonator, and is one of several hypothetical machines that use this model. These designs work by placing magnetron pulsed microwaves in a closed truncated cone, then pressing on the short end of the cone to propel the ship forward. This contrasts with the form of powered spacecraft, which burn large amounts of fuel, displacing enormous amounts of energy and mass to keep the rocket moving.
While testing was carried out on experimental versions of the drive - with low power consumption, driving several micro traction pumps (about the same as the weight of a penny). It is possible that some positive thrust results may be due to interference or an unaccounted for error with the test equipment.
While there is a lot of skepticism about the EM motor, it is important to note that there have been several people who have tested the drive and reported achieving thrust.
In 2001, Showyer received a £45,000 grant from the British government to test an EM engine. His test reportedly reached 0.016 Newtons of force and required 850 watts of power, but no peer review of the tests has confirmed this. However, it is worth noting that this number was quite low, which was potentially an experimental error.
In 2008, Yang Huang and a team of Chinese researchers at Northwestern Polytechnic University allegedly confirmed the theory regarding radio frequency resonant motors and subsequently built their own version in 2010, testing the drive several times from 2012 to 2014. Test results were supposedly positive, reaching up to 750 mN of thrust and requiring 2500 W of power.
In 2014, NASA researchers tested their own version of the EM engine, including in a hard vacuum. Once again, the group reported the tremor, and once again the data was not published through peer-reviewed sources. Other NASA groups are skeptical of the researchers' claims, but these findings do not confirm or refute the disk and require additional testing.
In 2015, the same NASA team tested chemical engineer Guido Fetta's version and reported positive net thrust. Likewise, the research team at Dresden University of Technology also tested the drive, again reporting the push as both predicted and unexpected.
Another test by a NASA research team in late 2015 seemed to confirm the validity of the EM engine. The test corrected the errors that occurred in previous tests and, amazingly, the drive achieved traction. However, the group has not yet submitted its findings for peer review. It is possible that other unexpected errors in the experiment could cause thrust (the most likely of which is that the vacuum has been compromised, causing the air within the test environment to heat and expand and the actuator to move). Whether the findings are published or not, more testing needs to be done. That's exactly what the Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory are aiming to do. For believers in the EV engine, there appears to be some hope.
In mid-2016, physicist Michael McCulloch, a researcher at the University of Plymouth in the United Kingdom, proposed a new theory that could provide an explanation for the thrust observed in the tests. McCulloch's theory is about inertia and something called the Unruh effect, a concept predicted by relativity that an accelerating observer sees a background of radiation around him, even if the non-accelerating observer sees nothing.
McCulloch's new theory focuses on the unconfirmed concept of Unruh radiation, which finds that particles are formed from the vacuum of space as a direct result of the observed heating of the Universe due to acceleration. This theoretical concept is largely consistent with our current understanding of the universe and predicts the inertia results we currently observe, although with one notable exception: small accelerations on the scale of roughly what was observed in EM motor testing.
This acceleration occurs as a result of Unruh radiation particles whose wavelengths increase as they accelerate. Unruh particles at different wavelengths would be located at both ends of the EM drive cone, and as they bounce around inside the cone, their inertia would also change, eventually leading to thrust.
McCulloch's theory is admittedly a bit difficult to communicate to lay people. If you are interested and want to read further into the theory, you can read McCulloch's entire article discussing his theory. The point here is that if the Unruh effect and radiation are confirmed, it offers a completely plausible explanation for previously seemingly impossible observations of EM engine motion. This will require further research and experimentation, and will also give the motor system even more impetus to test.
What if it works?
It's easy to see how the scientific community is wary of the EV engine. But on the other hand, the wealth of research raises several questions: Why is there such interest in the technology, and why do so many people want to test it? What exactly is the drive to make such an attractive idea? While everything from atmospheric control satellites to safer, more efficient cars have been floated as potential propulsion applications, the real appeal of the technology and the impetus for its creation in the first place are the implications for space travel.
A spacecraft equipped with an EM drive could get to the Moon in just a few hours, to Mars in two to three months, and to Pluto within two years. These are extremely bold claims, but if EV propulsion turns out to be a legitimate technology, they may not be so strange. And without the need to pack several tons of fuel, the spacecraft becomes cheaper and much lighter. However, in order to become a reality, science must add up.
Showyer is adamant that there is no need for junk science or quantum theories to explain how an EM drive works. Instead, he believes current models of Newtonian physics offer an explanation, and he has written papers on the subject, one of which is currently being reviewed by experts. Although Showyer has been criticized by other scientists in the past for having incorrect and inconsistent science, a clear scientific explanation can begin to legitimize the EV engine and encourage more testing and research.
Despite his insistence that the drive behaves within the laws of physics, this did not stop him from making bold claims about the EM drive. Schowyer stated that the new drive created warp bubbles that allow the drive to move, claiming that this is how the test results were achieved. Such claims deserve great interest, but lack clear supporting data and require careful testing and discussion to take Showier's claims seriously. Hopefully there will be drive tests done to help figure out how this works.
Clearly, a working EV engine could open up exciting possibilities for both space and terrestrial travel - not to mention challenging our understanding of physics.
