Alcubierre Drive

The standard method for humans to cross interstellar distances without simply accelerating or taking to long that they need generation ships.

Utility

The drive is perhaps the most useful single technology in human explored space. It is the one thing that more than anything makes possible exploration beyond the Sol system within a normal human lifespan.

Inventor(s)

Miguel Alcubierre first proposed the basic idea of the drive in 1994, but it was not until 2399 that Zhao Jiaying created the plans for the first working Alcubierre drive.

Access & Availability

Alcubierre drive ships are expensive, and usually only owned by large corporations and governments.

Complexity

In principle the Alcubierre drive is farily simple, requiring only masses of opposite polarity, but in principle each drive is highly complex as they are inherently unstable and need to be monitored millisecond by millisecond by computer to avoid warp field collapse.

Discovery

First proposed in 1994 by Miguel Alcubierre the drive was first made operational in 2403