Urban Sims

Chapter 306 Light Speed ​​Barrier, Time Dilation
How big is the universe?
Greater than tens of billions of light-years.

How big is the Milky Way?
[-] light-years in diameter.

How big is a star system?
Not big, about a light-year in radius.

But even with a short distance of one light-year, Feitian flew for nearly three years at a low flight speed.

Why can't it be faster and accelerate directly to the maximum state?
Mainly for the safety of the spacecraft.

Because there is a circle of asteroid belt 5000 million kilometers away from Pharaoh, and there are a lot of space meteorites. Even if the density is relatively sparse, the speed of meteorites is very slow, and the probability of collision is very low. At a speed of no more than 0.2 times the speed of light, it passed through the asteroid belt within ten minutes.

Beyond the asteroid belt, at a distance of more than one billion kilometers, there is another material belt called the "Kopi Belt", which contains many frozen meteorites and asteroids. There are more meteorites in it, but the density is also higher. Small, not very threatening, so the Feitian did not slow down much, and passed through the Coboy belt.

The next long section of the journey is relatively safe and smooth, but after the Feitian accelerated its speed to 0.40 times the speed of light, it still did not dare to drive to the maximum speed.

Because there is a material belt at the outermost edge close to one light-year away from the central star, which is called the "Oort Nebula". Ice-bound matter clusters have a very low density, and it is even difficult to find traces of their distribution under the faint light of stars.

When crossing the Oort Nebula, Sugaru had to be careful not to hit a mass of matter—even if it was only the size of a baseball.

The radar system is turned on at full power, and the weapon officer Gu Fan enters the best shooting position. Once a threatening frozen meteorite appears in front of him, he will immediately destroy it with a high-energy laser!
"boom!"

"boom!"

"boom!"

From the outer shell of the spaceship, there were bangs, subtle and crisp.

Under a high-magnification microscope, it can be seen that in the Oort Nebula, some small molecular substances are colliding violently with the force field alloy of the outer shell of the Feitian spacecraft, and even rubbed out one after another on the surface of the spacecraft. The "spark" is like an explosion.

In fact, this is an explosion. Even if the Feitian at 0.4 times the speed of light collides with a stationary atom, the huge relative speed is equivalent to a collision at a low-to-medium energy level in a particle accelerator, which can even disperse the nucleus. .

Fortunately, the force field alloy that makes up the shell of the Feitian will have a layer of high-strength electric field attached to its surface. When negatively charged electrons collide with this layer of electric field, they will be absorbed, and positively charged atomic nuclei will be bounced back (photons will also rebound), thereby avoiding the bombardment of the outer atomic nuclei, bringing damage to the surface of the spacecraft.

However, this layer of force field can provide good protection when the speed of the spacecraft is less than 0.5 times the speed of light and the density of the impacting object is small. If you resist, the hull will be damaged.

This is the reason why it is difficult for an object to break through the speed of light under conventional dynamic conditions. The faster the speed, the greater the energy that needs to be given. In the thin space of matter, even a collision with an extremely small amount of elements will produce great destructive power.

In addition, there is a ubiquitous "gravitational field" in the universe. In this gravitational field, the faster the moving object, the greater the mass, and the increased mass will slow down the moving speed of the object. As a result, it will never be able to break through the speed of light.

Combining the above factors, the conclusion is: the moving speed of any object cannot exceed that of light.

This is the "light speed barrier".

The speed of light barrier cannot be broken through, but it does not fully mean that human beings cannot fly faster than the speed of light.

For example, there is a kind of curvature engine. By twisting the space, the spacecraft can "slide" forward in the distorted space-time like a person walking downhill. By changing the space, it can achieve super-light speed flight.

Theoretically speaking, the curvature engine can achieve faster-than-light flight, but how?What is the specific principle?The scientists of the Blue Star Federation have not grasped it so far, and have not even touched the door... Science is not imagination, not movies and novels. Every leap forward in science requires a long period of exploration.

And the accumulation of countless failures.

"The Feitian has passed through the Oort Nebula and entered the absolute vacuum."

On this day, according to the monitoring data, the spacecraft brain reported.

"Finally out of the range of Birla Star!"

Yun Xinghe heaved a sigh of relief. Within the sphere of influence of the stars, he always had the feeling of being bound. Now Feitian has flown 1 light-year away. In the absolute vacuum area where there is almost only dim starlight, the spacecraft can accelerate to the maximum speed. quick.

"Navigation Officer, have you calculated the route? You have been calculating for more than two years, have you calculated the best route?" Yun Xinghe asked.

"Forget it!"

Navigator Belekov opened the projected star map, drew a smooth and curved arc in the air with his finger, and said with a serious face: "Follow this route, and we can save 11 days before reaching the Omar Nebula. , and 0.4 per ten thousand fuel, this is the most economical route."

"11 days?"

Sugaru in the driving position curled his lips, shook his head and said, "Brother Belekov, our voyage is 186 years, and you helped save ten days?"

"A few ten-thousandths of the fuel is used up by pushing the booster rod in my hand for a few minutes. How can I save it?"

Sugaru's face was full of disdain.

"Drive your spaceship well, don't talk nonsense!"

Yun Xinghe glared at him, then turned to Belekov and said, "Ignore him, import the route into the intelligent driving system, the spaceship will start to accelerate soon."

"Yes, Captain."

After Belekov introduced the route into the driving system, Yun Xinghe issued an instruction: "The chief engineer pays attention to the working status of the engine, and the helmsman starts to accelerate!"

"Yes!"

"Yes!"

After the output power of the material reactor was increased, Sugaru looked excited, and when he exerted force with his hand, he pushed down the afterburner lever.

A strong push came from the back.

“飞船正在加速，当前加速度为1G、1.5G、2G……7G、8G，已达到最大。”

"The current speed of the spaceship is 0.4000012 times the speed of light, 0.4000014 times the speed of light..."

"Oh ~ Accelerate! Accelerate!" Seeing the speedometer, the speed of the spaceship is increasing, Sugaru yelled, his face full of excitement.

However, the acceleration of 8G is equivalent to the weight of eight people on their bodies. Everyone is a little uncomfortable. The male players may be okay, but the weaker female players are all trying to persevere.

"Meiqin, Aijia, Qiaoqiao, this acceleration will last for 100 hours, can you all hold on?"

"Persevere." Koran Mikoto said softly.

"What is this level? I have played more exciting games before." Uehara Aika looked relaxed. As a repair officer and a woman, she can indeed bear this level.

"Brother, I can do it." Yun Qiaoqiao's face was a little pale. She was the weakest among the three female team members. In other words, there are indeed certain challenges.

"The chief engineer and helmsman, reduce the acceleration of the spacecraft to 6G for 50 hours, and accelerate in three times." In order to take care of the female team members on board, Yun Xinghe adjusted the acceleration strategy.

"Yes!"

After a while, everyone's burden was reduced and they felt a lot more comfortable.

……

A month later.

Feitian reached its maximum speed - 0.55 times the speed of light.

The three main engines were shut down, and the two low-power engines were started every ten hours to keep the spacecraft roaming at a constant speed.

Before entering the dormant cabin to sleep, Yun Xinghe and all the crew members planned to record a video and send it to relatives far away on the planet Bora to report their safety.

Exactly 0.5 light-months ahead, there is a large quantum communication relay base station. Through this relay base station, the recorded video can be transmitted to the Bora star within 2 seconds, and because of the short distance, the amount of information There is not much restriction on the Internet, as long as it does not exceed 1G.

So taking advantage of this last opportunity to express their missing relatives unrestrainedly, each of the ten crew members on the Feitian talked for more than half an hour in front of the camera, making all kinds of grimaces, taking selfies, and chatting with teammates. For interaction, finally, after compressing the video with a high bit rate format, the amount of information is only 0.8G.

Before sending the message, the time on the spaceship was September 1531, 9, 11:9:48, because it was necessary to mark the time on the video. Yun Xinghe subconsciously entered this time, and the first officer, Lan Xiulong, left Coming over, he suddenly shook his head and said, "No, this time is wrong."

"Why not?"

Yun Xinghe raised his head, and Fox questioned.

"The speed of Feitian is now 0.55 times the speed of light. According to the time dilation formula, our time should be expanded by 1.156 times. That is to say, we spend 1 day in Feitian, and 1.156 days have passed outside. For those who entered this speed a month ago, the outside world should have passed 34.68 days, and they may have already been on September 9th and 15th."

"Oh, I almost forgot that."

Yun Xinghe slapped himself on the head, and immediately changed the recording time of the video.

In fact, the clock in Feitian will be adjusted every once in a while, especially the hometown time. They have adjusted it dozens of times in the past three years. Up to now, the accumulated time difference between the two clocks has exceeded 100 days.

According to the theory of relativity, the faster the moving object, the slower the time flow. If the speed of the spacecraft can reach 0.999C, the time will expand by 22.36 times, and the closer to the speed of light, the more time will expand.

This is a normal physical phenomenon, especially for astronauts who are active in space, time slows down, their aging speed will be slower than outside, and those places they want to go will feel earlier than expected arrive.

But for loved ones, the faster you run, the faster they age and leave you.

In this regard, time is unfair, as if playing a joke on you, playing tricks on your common sense.

But this is the law of physics, this... is the law of space and time.

　Some readers said that water, in fact, the theme of this dungeon is adventure, not daily pretentiousness, but also some common sense of science, and the magic of the universe. It's not a fantasy fantasy disguised as science fiction
　　
　
(End of this chapter)