Between the Stars: Subspace Phenomenon & Space Travel Without Warp

Utilizing what we know in universe as a starting point for speculation, what sort of phenomenon could cause an inability to travel at warp speeds in a certain sector of space, forcing a starship to utilize impulse drives or other means of travel which don't interact with space and subspace in the same manner as a warp engine (explaining why starships have not explored said area sooner)?

Is it feasible to travel through multiple star systems (say in a sector of space or a stellar nursery, for example) at sublight speed, such as those provided by impulse drives? If not, what sort of (non warp or transwarp) drive might be able to propel a ship at feasible speed through these areas?

I am open to theories that step outside the box such as utilizing alien propulsion drives (though sticking to in-universe "facts" as much as possible.) Thoughts?

 

Just a strong enough subspace distortion in any given area would be enough to make warp drive impossible in that area. Although impulse power is generally associated with slower-than-light propulsion, this is not always the case in Trek in which some vehicles can move at seemingly FTL velocities at impulse.

It may be a case that you can travel at FTL at impulse, but it may not be the most efficient method of interstellar flight or it may be that warp is just exponentially faster. The original Enterprise had her warp drive knocked out in "Where No Man Has Gone Before," and although she was years away from the nearest starbase, it only took days for her to travel from the edge of the Galaxy to the nearest planet at impulse.

 

Omega

 

That's along the lines of what I was thinking (referencing episodes like "Forces of Nature" and "The Omega Directive"), but what sort of potential explanations do we have for such widespread subspace disruptions (beyond excessive warp travel and the Omega molecule, which have been used in the above referenced episodes)? Or is it supportable (based on what we see in universe) to suppose that a region of space might simply have a natural subspace instability?

That's a good point. If I recall correctly, "The Doomsday Machine" also gives evidence to this effect on the Original Series when Enterprise is fleeing the planet killer.

Although I actually believe otherwise, assuming we can't use impulse to travel at lightspeed (or that traveling at lightspeed would have too much interaction with subspace to be safe or possible in this theoretical region of space), what's the theoretical minimum sublight speed a starship would have to be capable of to make intersystem travel feasible?

Would 0.5c, such as what is seen in the Motion Picture actually make it reasonable? And is there evidence in the rest of the franchise to support such speeds at impulse?

I assume you're suggesting the Omega molecule as an explanation for a sector of space (like the Lantaru Sector, part of my inspiration for this musing) having a subspace instability?

 

In First Contact (the movie), the Phoenix explicitly moves from sublight to FTL using the most primitive of warp drives. There is no sign that two power sources are in use - in fact the power source is not specified but its hard to reconcile that it is based on antimatter. So i read this as a warp capable ship (CLEARLY!) that can use its warp drive to move at sublight. I think the distinction between the two systems comes much later and if for efficiency purposes / higher speed. Clearly only one drive system can drive a ship both sublight or FTL.

 

According to Memory Alpha:

The area known as the Briar Patch contained the stars SNC 461206 and UFC 8177. In the surrounding area, SNR 093120, UFC 9364, NGC 2812, and QSR 390021 were all visible on star charts of sector 441.

This region was essentially a gas cloud, known for containing dangerous space matter, including false vacuum fluctuations, metaphasic radiation, and at least two habitable planets, one of which was settled by the Ba'ku. As well it was flooded with radiation from supernova remnants.

Ships in the vicinity had to travel at less than one-third impulse power to avoid overheating the vessel's impulse manifolds. According to Admiral Dougherty, ships entering the region usually were specially fitted for that purpose. (Star Trek: Insurrection)

 

From what we've seen in Trek so far, they really haven't unlocked all the secrets of subspace yet. Subspace distortions can be either natural or artificial in origin and their sizes can vary from something that covers an area not much larger than the size of a ship to something multiple AUs in size. Warp engines do seem to be subspace distortion makers by their very nature, but many distortions are of unknown origin or caused when subspace interacts with normal space. Like an ocean, it could very well be that subspace in one region can be very calm and then very turbulent in another based on local conditions.

Presumably, impulse engines could produce sublight velocities just up to the speed of light. Maybe somewhere between 0.9c and 0.999c if necessary. I think the real limitation to sublight flight may be time dilation. The closer a ship approaches the speed-of-light threshold, the greater the time dilation may be, to the point where a sublight ship arrives at its destination in a few days or weeks only for the crew to find that many years or even decades have passed on Earth. That could wreck Starfleet mission time tables. The old TNG Technical Manual suggested that impulse engines use subspace components to minimize (but not totally eliminate) time dilation. In TMP, the Enterprise did use impulse power to reach Warp 0.5 to get to the middle Sol System, but that was just for a few hours. No big deal. On an extended voyage at Warp 0.5, though, there would have to be a serious adjustment of the ship's clocks with Earth as the trip goes on. The TNG Technical Manual suggested no more than 0.25c (full impulse) as the recommended maximum velocity for long sublight flights, but there's been nothing onscreen to support that.

 

TNG Technical Manual Impulse Drive
It just constantly adjusts the computer clock rapidly, but after 0.25c, it becomes really taxing on the computer systems.
The Space-Time Driver Coils is used to "Lower the internal Mass" and allow Space/Time to slide past the vessel more smoothly.

IMO, the Aeon Time Shuttle had a "Hyper-Impulse", which in my head canon solved the issue of Time Dilation by creating a energy efficient Static Warp Field that isolated local time and helped lower internal mass even more. This allowed speeds past 0.25c but at some point as you approach the speed of light, the energy efficiency curve will make more sense to just use "Warp Drive" the closer you get to 1.0c. By that point, it makes no sense to continue at STL and just activate the Warp drive because of the amount of energy you are consuming would be equivalent to even basic Warp 1.0

 

That's what I was referring to in my earlier post. You can push impulse engines all the way to the speed-of-light, but beyond 0.25c, time dilation becomes an exponential hassle and can interfere with Starfleet mission scheduling and coordination. It's likely for this reason that 0.25c was designated as "full impulse" in the TNG TM. Any sublight velocity beyond that is probably reserved for very short sprints. Otherwise, a ship would probably just go to Warp 1 and avoid time dilation altogether.

 

But that's not really true - the TM doesn't establish "full impulse" in terms of speed at all.

There are multiple mentions of impulse travel at higher than 0.25c specifically (say, 0.75c on p.75), but even those don't associate an impulse setting with a speed. Logically, you would eventually achieve 0.75c by applying 1/16 impulse, too - and conversely, full impulse might not make you move much at first.

The 0.25c thing is only ever called the velocity for "normal impulse operations", while 0.75c+ is considered a subset of "high impulse operations", such speeds being "acceptable options during some missions".

The TM doesn't go explicit on whether Kirk did warp or impulse for 0.5c in TMP, but does mention that warp is capable of sublight and that impulse simply is the more efficient alternative at 0.5c. OTOH, the TM doesn't suggest that impulse could do FTL.

The Phoenix is interesting in that she features a pair of nacelles and a giant rocket nozzle thing, but the nozzle never ever glows. Instead, the rig starts shaking while Cochrane, Riker and LaForge are making preparations for activating the warp engines; starts moving faster when Cochrane engages the nacelles; proceeds at ever-accelerating sublight for at least a minute; and then reaches warp speed - all the time showing that the nacelles glow but the nozzle does not.

So the rig apparently has three separate propulsion systems. One makes her leave the first stage booster behind and shake while the crew primes the warp core; another applies the warp field via the nacelles to accelerate her from "relative speed 20,000 kps" via "critical velocity" to lightspeed and beyond; and quite possibly a third exists to bring her back home without risking another warp sortie, this making use of the nozzle at long last.

Or then the nozzle is just for purging the system after warp, and the initial make-shake drive takes the heroes back home. I really can't see Cochrane pressing the big red button a second time, not before having at least two bottles of something stronger than carried Phoenix-board...

But yeah, it's clear that warp engines can move you at sublight - and implicit that primitive warp engines take ages to bring you from sublight to warp.

Using high impulse to go to a nearby star shouldn't take too long, and you can possibly also time travel at the destination to turn your objective travel time to effective zero - but your subjective travel time, dilation and all, will still have aged you much more than if you did a warp hop. Possibly perfect for the needs of drama in DSC where the heroes indeed can time travel, even if they can't warp or spore jump... But unlikely to be used by the writers, even the novel writers who in turn have already had their fun with relativity/time travel combinations in other settings.

Timo Saloniemi

 

There is a definite lack of specificity as to how the Phoenix functions. We get references to titanium casing, a fuel manifold, an intermix chamber, a warp plasma conduit, and at least two intake valves, though, and there is a an implied separation between the sublight and warp drives. Cochrane refers to a first stage shutdown and separation in flight, which seems consistent with the apparent rocket like propulsion the starship uses to break orbit (as used by NASA in the real world), and after achieving it Geordi brings the warp core online for their FTL flight.

We can't be certain of all of this drive's components or how it might differ from its 23rd and 24th century cousins, but we do know that the warp core activation brings plasma injectors online as well, that there are some sort of cells (presumably energy cells) which are reported as charged and ready, and that the drive is responsible for creating a warp field, and possibly a structural integrity field (it is unclear if its condition is just being reported now and it was already active or if the warp engine has initiated the SIF as well.)

Intermix chambers are used to regulate plasma pressure in warp cores, which in of itself only tells us (along with the plasma injectors, which propel drive plasma into the warp coils) that the system is fueled via plasma -- perhaps even electro-plasma, though we can't definitely assert that.

24th century Starfleet warp engines are fueled by the reaction of matter (deuterium) and antimatter (anti-deuterium), which is channeled through dilithium crystals to produce electro-plasma, the primary energy source for most Federation starships.

In contrast, I do agree it is hard to reconcile the use of matter/anti-matter reaction assemblies in Cochrane's ship (mostly because I doubt that they've discovered dilithium, a critical component in that reaction), but it carries most of the other hallmarks of the later warp core systems. Perhaps it utilizes a form of fusion generator like the Botany Bay, or deuterium, but not in an anti-deuterium mix, and the later improvements to the warp drive involve the discovery of dilithium and the means to create anti-matter?

That's a good example of the sort of thing I was thinking about when I made my original post. It's been awhile since I watched Insurrection and it didn't occur to me the Briar Patch was a decent example of a natural phenomenon similar to what I was musing.

Do we know why starships can only move at one-third impulse, what the negative consequences might be, or how they were modified to prevent these problems? The script gives us some indications, but nothing solid that I can discern.

RIKER: Full impulse.
LAFORGE: The manifolds can't handle full impulse in the Patch, Commander.
RIKER: If we don't outrun them, the manifolds are going to be the only thing left on this ship.
LAFORGE: I'll be in engineering.
...
DANIELS: Shields at sixty percent!

[Enterprise-E engineering]

LAFORGE (on intercom): Engineering to bridge. We're burning deuterium down here. We're going to blow ourselves up. We won't need any help from the Son'a.

It has something to do with the manifolds (are these the warp manifolds?) overheating and deuterium burning, but what? Does anybody have a theory or educated guess? Admiral Dougherty sure didn't give us enough information to go on.

DOUGHERTY (on viewscreen): Your ship hasn't been fitted for this region. There are environmental concerns.
PICARD: What kind of concerns?
DOUGHERTY (on viewscreen): We haven't fully identified the anomalies yet. They're calling this whole area the Briar Patch. It took us a day to reach a location where we could even get a signal to you. Just get me Data's schematics. I'll keep you informed. Dougherty out.

That makes sense given their nature, as you say, subspace interaction being critical to how warp fields warp space in order to move starships. Your comparison of space (and subspace) to an ocean is one that the writers seem to agree with, having used it themselves to define how the two deal with one another. This is born out in concepts like "subspace eddies" and "subspace sandbars."

I agree completely with this interpretation of how impulse drive's real limiter in exceeding the speed of light is the negative consequences of time dilation without the protection of the sort of pocket space seen within warp fields (so that the ship is not exceeding lightspeed, but rather suspended within a field that is doing so.) Given that, would you say dilation would be a manageable problem if impulse was used at this speeds for small "jumps," even if repeated "jumps" were made over time?

I know it would be theoretical, and I don't expect anyone here to be any more of a scientist than I am, but does anyone know enough about the issues related to the time dilation (theorized to be) seen when approaching light speed to speculate about the amount of time dilation that might be seen over different periods of time or at different percentages of light speed?

Maybe this should be its own thread separate from this one? If so, somebody let me know and I'll be happy to make it into one.

 

Minor points about the Phoenix:

...And the test rig keeps shaking all that time, as if under thrust. That is, after separation, and before warp core activation. Perhaps Cochrane just had some substandard pumps installed?

...Nacelles? That's what I'm hearing there. Could in theory be "main cells", too, but considering what they are trying to achieve, it would make sense for them to activate specific pieces of hardware in sequence, starting with the core and then proceeding with the nacelles, which get charged by the former.

Indeed. Might also be the third, separate major piece of hardware to be brought online at an appropriate point. Curious how its readout is combined with that of the warp field, though.

Or then antimatter annihilation can be relatively easily harnessed, and antimatter creation by the magic charge-flipping tech of the TNG TM has already been discovered by the 2050s, and Cochrane just gets inferior mileage from an engine running without dilithium (or paralithium, or whatever-lihtium).

I mean, it's less than a decade to the launch of Friendship One, which explicitly carries the secret of antimatter tech within her. I don't see a major reason to think Cochrane would have been unable to obtain antimatter. Or antigravity, for that matter. These technologies get introduced at some point, and as long as we don't know that point, we can assume whatever we wish.

Well, impulse manifolds are a thing, too (and a big issue in ENT, apparently very maintenance-heavy and sensitive). It would be natural to assume that it's impulse manifolds specifically that limit impulse to 1/3. The name is vague enough, suggesting the splitting of output or combining of input; the latter might be what gets clogged first when the starship ingests gas, and we do have a reason to think the E-E is ingesting, even though I'll be damned if I know what possible reason a starship would have for ingesting anything when it does just fine in absolute vacuum 99% of the time.

"Burning deuterium" is probably colloquial - in "Doomsday Machine" we hear that moving at impulse consumes fuel at a rather alarming rate even when nothing is broken or clogged, so LaForge might simply be worried that they're soon running out of oomph if nothing improves or the battle doesn't conclude.

Timo Salonniemi

 

Equate that impulse is like "propellors" pushing against a medium like water to generate thrust. If impulse (like a gravity drive) actually pushes against subspace (realm of gravity) for thrust might explain the Briar Patch. It's like motoring in viscous mud or syrup instead of water if we use the propellor example. Perhaps the impulse-to-subspace interaction mechanism gives resistance force back into the impulse drive. This might also explain a sublight speed limit for impulse; at some point, the impulse force is unable to overcome the subspace viscosity.

 

Small jumps are probably the only way you can do it. Perhaps a quick dash to the middle of a solar system or between planets in the same system. Enough to cross a few billion kilometers in real time, but the clocks might start acting funny when crossing a light-year or more.

The funny thing about time dilation is that it has a greater impact on the crew of a ship than anyone else. If a ship leaves Earth at 0.99c for a star system 100 light-years away, it will reach that system in a little over 100 years. But because time slowed down for the crew of that ship, those 100+ years on Earth seemed more like only 14 years to them.

Here's a pretty good time dilation calendar where you can enter your percentage of lightspeed and then distance (in light-years) to see how time flows differently on a sublight ship compared to time back on Earth:
https://www.emc2-explained.info/Dilation-Calc/#.X3eGc2hKiHs

 

Time Dilation might be a great method for a one way trip to the future while crossing a short distance on a galactic scale.

If they can "Shield" the computers from the effects but let human's feel it, you could potentially travel into the future at little "Time Cost" to your life.

 

It seems I missed some newer comments while making my first response out. I guess I'll have to pay more attention to that little alerts tab at the top of my page.

So what do you think based on what we've seen -- do you believe the impulse drive is capable of accelerating a starship to faster than light speeds?

The intermediate propulsion drive was apparently Phoenix's sublight drive, or the warp drive being used to propel the ship at sublight velocities. I'd have to assume that the shaking we witnessed was a result of the structural integrity field being primitive compared to what we're used to seeing in the 23rd and 24th centuries. Our only real reference point is Geordi stating that Phoenix's structural integrity was holding, and this was after the warp core was brought online, so is it possible that the integrity field operates as a sub-function of the warp drive?

LAFORGE: Warp field is looking good. Structural integrity is holding.
RIKER: Speed, twenty thousand kilometers per second.

According to Google (admittedly a search engine and not a scientific expert) the speed of light in a vacuum is 299,792 km/second. If my math is correct (and I'm not a mathematician either), that would make Phoenix's movement speed here approximately 6.68% of the speed of light. The fastest velocity achievable with current technology (at least as far as I can uncover) is the Solar Probe Plus, which launched in 2018 and reached a speed of approximately 202 km/second. That is quite an improvement over modern rocket propulsion.

I wonder, did Phoenix use a matter/anti-matter intermix channeled through dilithium like 23rd and 24th century starships, or did it use a fusion reactor or something more akin to the third generation ion propulsion drive present in the Ares IV craft flown by John Kelly thirty-one years earlier (in 2032)?

The hypothetical scenario I'm trying to feel out would require using an alternate propulsion method from warp drive (at least at warp speeds) due to a large area of space hampered with naturally occurring subspace disruptions (and perhaps various radiation types, such as the metreon radiation which caused the U.S.S. Olympia to crash in 2371.)

Warp hops may be possible in certain areas, but the naturally inhospitable spatial phenomena would make this dangerous and an impractical tactic more often than not. This is the reason that the area remains more or less unexplored by the major Alpha and Beta Quadrant powers despite being relatively close from a galactic standpoint.

I'm willing to think outside the box (and I find the time dilation issue a potential source of interest when traveling through such an environment) but I don't think I'm ready to suggest time travel at our starship's destination in order to retroactively resolve a good portion of its issues in transit.

A question that occurs to me, though, is does the warp drive still interact with subspace at the same level or in the same way when it is being used to apply sublight propulsion?

I kind of meandered on and addressed my thoughts about this up above.

I pulled the scene up and actually rewatched it, and I believe you're right. I'm certain he is saying warp nacelles. When I was making my last response I was relying solely on the script at Chakoteya.net instead of reviewing the actual footage. That's the first time I've noticed an error in one of their transcriptions.

I hadn't remembered the date that Friendship One had been launched, but you are right that it was a very short time after first contact (2067, four years later to be exact), which makes his use of anti-matter much more likely, especially as the probe was explicitly stated (in backstage information) to be modeled after the Phoenix.

The "Voyager" episode also makes it clear that the probe was sent out ahead of humanity who had not yet found a way to have left our solar system (reliably and consistently at any rate), and this was the only way we could contact the interstellar community prior to our starships flying amongst them.

Taking this into account, I think it could make sense that Cochrane's warp core used antimatter but lacked dilithium as it is a reasonably rare element found only on a few planets throughout the known galaxy.

Further, in the 23rd and 24th century dilithium is used to regulate the matter/anti-matter reaction in warp cores, controlling the amount of power generated in the reaction chamber and channeling the release of that electro-plasma. If Phoenix lacked that element, it might explain the shaking we see during the second stage of its first warp flight, lacking the refinement in its power regulation later starships would see.

I would have assumed it was a figure of speech, but he follows it up with a line about blowing themselves up which made me question if perhaps there was more meaning behind it.

LAFORGE (on intercom): Engineering to bridge. We're burning deuterium down here. We're going to blow ourselves up. We won't need any help from the Son'a.

I suppose this could be taken to mean that something in the Briar Patch is causing the impulse system to function less efficiently, thus deuterium is being consumed at an accelerated rate (more fuel, less energy derived from it), all of which could be essentially overtaxing (perhaps overheating) the system. If this were true, it could reconcile the recommendation against full impulse, the implied increased deuterium usage, and the threat of blowing themselves up.

That all makes sense to me, though we admittedly know very little about how the impulse manifolds function, making me wish I had a more solid answer on the whats, hows, and whys of this particular piece of technology. I think if we assume the manifolds are being clogged or otherwise affected, it might go hand in hand with my speculation above (that the system is functioning less efficiently, burning more fuel, and overtaxing itself as a result.)

This might fit in with the idea I posited above that the drive is essentially being overworked in the Briar Patch, consuming more resources (deuterium in this case) for fewer gains.

We have a fairly good understanding of the mechanics of warp drive. I wish we had a similar understanding of how impulse works. Does it use a subspace field like warp, but to a lesser degree, pushing off subspace (as you suggest) as opposed to creating an entire subspace field around the ship? Does anyone have a compelling theory on this?

A tactic like that wouldn't allow continuous long distance travel, but using short dashes to travel over time would still lead you to cross great distances in far less time than you would by only traveling at impulse, right? The real question, I suppose, would be "is it fast enough to not waste a huge chunk (i.e. years) of your life if you were forced to travel through several star systems in such a manner?" If not, it's back to the drawing board (or the speculating board, if you will.)

Thanks for the link. I've added it to my references and resources bookmarks. As a writer and a GM, I find it useful to keep ahold of things like this (star maps, distance conversions, etc.)

It's certainly a unique way to engage in time travel. At short distances (galactically speaking) it might be well worth it, especially if you could refine the dilation and learn to predict the exact results in regards to various length journeys.

 

The solution used in the 20th-Century--in the Trek Universe--was to use "sleeper ships" like Khan's Botany Bay to travel to other star systems as such voyages took years. And it would only be fairly nearby systems to Sol as farther away ones could take decades or even centuries.

 

It is a solid solution if you don't mind sleeping through your journey, if arriving at the destination unaffected and unchanged is the primary goal (and I'm sure there are plenty of situations where that would be the case, and even more sure there's a great protagonist's story to be told with that as a backdrop), but for my theoretical scenario I don't think it would work as well.

The hypothetical situation here would be the active exploration of a region of space littered with subspace disruptions and other unsafe spatial phenomenon (metreon radiation, for example) by a small starship which is prevented from moving at warp due to said environment.

I can't see it being practical for a starship actively traveling through an unpredictable and unstable sector like that (as opposed to passing through incidentally on their way to a different destination) to keep its crew in suspended animation. I suppose it could be done if the starship's computers were programmed to awaken them under specific circumstances such as the sensors detecting certain radiations, subspace fluctuations, etcetera, but it doesn't seem like the choice one would make if they could make another one.

Of course, normally, a starship could attempt to maneuver around this sector of space, but let's say they can't. Let's say they're searching for a lost ship inside the unstable area. They've picked up the distress signal, but it's coming from deep in the heart of that region. They can't travel at warp, so what do they do? Is sublight at some percentage of lightspeed really viable?

To try to judge some estimated distances, the distance from Sol to the outer edge of the Oort Cloud (based on my research) is theorized to be around 10,000 AU. It takes 8 minutes for light to travel 1 AU (from Sol to Earth), so it would take 80,000 minutes for light to travel from Sol to the Oort Cloud's outer edge. We can divide a few times to narrow this down to a more manageable number and arrive at 7.94 weeks' distance at light speed. If we were moving at 0.5c, this would become 15.88 weeks. If we were moving at 0.25c, this would be 31.76 weeks.

Now, I'm not a mathematician, and I know we can't assume that every star system will be the same size as our own, but I believe my math holds up, and the size of the solar system makes a good average to work with. If I've made any errors anywhere, feel free to correct me (I haven't slept yet and words are more my area than numbers.)

Assuming my work is solid, though, that means lightspeed would allow travel through a star system about every 2 months, travel at 0.5c would permit travel through a star system about every 4 months, and travel at 0.25c would accomplish the same in about 8 months (about sixty-seven percent of a year.)

Of course, this isn't taking potential time dilation into account. Someone else here would have to elaborate on that, I think, if they have some ideas about how that might come into play over those times and at those speeds because that certainly isn't my area.

Is there something in established canon (by statement, evidence, or implication) anyone can think of that would allow a starship to circumvent time dilation without resorting to the creation of a warp field? Is sublight travel at the above velocities truly viable for exploring multiple star systems clustered in the same region of space?

 

You'd probably have to build a network of warp gates or artificial wormholes for your sublight ships. The alternative would be to make those multiple star systems all light-months instead of light-years apart.

I think the stumbling block in your scenario is trying to explore other systems at only sublight speeds without it taking years to do so.

 

That's what I've done in my Head Cannon for civilian Space Travel.
Unless you have a civilian rated Engineer's license to operate and maintain a Advanced Reactor (Fusion, M/A-M, Artificial Singularity, Tetryon, etc), most civilians will be using their personal STL Astro-Mobile / Space Car / Shuttle Craft which will run on Condensed Energy Matrix batteries that can power their STL Impulse engines.

I have Transwarp Corridor Highways to link nearby systems.

Graviton Catapults for long distance System to System travel.

Warp Sleds for personal FTL exploration that are also powered by the Condensed Energy Matrix.