A recently leaked, unpublished paper from NASA reveals that NASA has made a functioning Radio Frequency Resonant Cavity Thruster, otherwise known as electromagnetic propulsion drive or EM Drive or Warp Drive – a space engine with fuel-free propulsion system. The EM Drive uses magnetic waves to create thrust by bouncing microwave photons within a closed cone-shaped metal vessel shown below. The motion causes the pointed end of the drive to generate thrust and propel it in the opposite direction. The microwaves gather electricity via solar power and it does not require a propellant. Critics remain skeptical about the idea saying that the engine violates basic Newton's Third Law of Motion, which states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.
According to state-of-the art theory, a warp drive could cut the travel time between stars from tens of thousands of years to weeks or months, of transporting humans to Mars in 10 weeks, fly to the Moon in four hours, and travel to Pluto in only 18 months - all without the need for a propellant.
As detailed in the paper, NASA physicists led by Harold “Sonny” White and Paul March were able to generate thrust in a “tapered RF test article” (EmDrive prototype) during a series of tests at NASA’s Eagleworks Labs at Johnson Space Center in the fall of 2015.
In short, the NASA engineers are trying to determine whether faster-than-light travel — warp drive — might someday be possible. The team is attempting to slightly warp the trajectory of a photon, changing the distance it travels in a certain area, and then observing the change with a device called an interferometer.
“Space has been expanding since the Big Bang 13.7 billion years ago,” White told the
New York Times in 2013. “And we know that when you look at some of the cosmology models, there were early periods of the universe where there was explosive inflation, where two points would’ve went receding away from each other at very rapid speeds. Nature can do it,” he added. “So the question is, can we do it?”
As detailed in the leaked paper, the NASA EmDrive test consists of a closed copper cone, that is bombarded with microwaves. The researchers powered it with 40, 60, and 80 watts and found that it generated up to 58, 128, and 119 micronewtons of thrust, respectively. Given that this “anomaly” was still observed by White and his colleagues after accounting for error, this suggests that the results of the experiment show an EmDrive is possible.