Hyperspace
Hyperspace is an alternate dimension used by several races for faster than light travel accessible by means of a hyperdrive. Entry into hyperspace is achieved when a vessel opens a subspace window, which allows a vessel to enter subspace and achieve faster-than-light velocities. While at its core all hyperdrive technology followed the same basics, the hyperdrive technology of each race was ultimately unique in the sense that they each produced a unique type of subspace frequency. If a subspace frequency would be disrupted, vessels are destroyed upon entry into hyperspace; other hyperdrives would remain uneffected due to the differences in frequency however.
Hyperspace Window Generator
Hyperdrives are devices which can propel spaceships through hyperspace, by opening a subspace window and traveling within a hyperspace field. A interstellar version is capable of propelling a vessel tens of thousands of times the speed of light, intergalactic versions are capable of many times greater then that.
Space Folding Drive
A space folding drive (also known as a coaxial induction drive or a differential induction drive) is a propulsion system that folds space in on itself, allowing instantaneous travel over huge distances. The coaxial core functions by drawing in subatomic particles and reconfiguring their internal geometries. However, the particles are unstable and can overload the engines in less sophisticated versions.
Quantum Slipstream Drive
The slipstream is a narrowly-focused, directed warp field that is initiated by manipulating the fabric of the space-time continuum at the quantum level. It works by focusing a quantum field through a deflector dish to generate massive changes in local space curvature; this creates a subspace tunnel, which is projected in front of the vessel. Once a ship has entered this tunnel, the forces inside propel it at incredible speed. In order to maintain the slipstream a ship has to constantly modify the quantum field with its deflector dish.
Slipstream Drive
Slipstream is an extension of our reality, an additional dimension that's integrally intertwined with our own. The slipstream is a place where quantum connections are visible as cords, especially the large and strong connections like those between huge concentrations of matter such as planets or suns. A spaceship that enters the slipstream can harness the energy of these cords and ride them from one star system to another.
One interesting thing about moving through the slipstream is that travel time between points has very little to do with the distance actually traveled. If a pilot is lucky, and the stream unfolds just right, the ship could transit between galaxies in minutes. But put an unlucky pilot at the helm and the same trip could take weeks or even months.
Luckily for the cause of interstellar commerce and communication, the more a certain path is frequently traveled, the faster, easier and more predictable the journey becomes. As a result, frequently-traveled routes between major worlds are safe and convenient.
Another unusual aspect of slipstream is the requirement of an organic pilot to guide a starship through the slipstream. At an intersection of pathways in slipstream space, both paths manifest the potentiality of being correct and incorrect. It's only when the pilot chooses a specific direction that this potentiality collapses and one path becomes right, and the other wrong. For reasons still not completely understood, organic beings tend to choose the correct paths, or more precisely, the very act of choosing makes the path they have chosen the correct one.
But strangely, computers -- even ones with artificial intelligence -- are incapable of this reality-altering guesswork. Even the most sophisticated starship in the Systems Commonwealth requires an organic sentient to pilot through the starlanes -- a prospect some sentients regard as deeply disturbing but others find comforting.
Slipspace Drive
Slipspace is a tangle of intertwined dimensions (estimated to be nine), comparably similar to a wadded up piece of paper, which lie underneath the three conventional spatial dimensions of the universe. Because of this tangle of intertwined dimensions, objects in slipspace often group together in mass transit. There are no ideas on why this occurs, other than brief speculations made in the novels.
This new engine allowed ships to tunnel into the Slipstream. Slipspace is a domain with alternate physical laws, allowing faster-than-light travel without relativistic side-effects i.e., the occupants do not "warp" time, despite their super-luminal speed. But however fast it may appear, faster-than-light travel is by no means instantaneous; "short" jumps routinely take up to two months, and "long" jumps can last six months or more; despite going faster than light, there is still a slight degree of Time Dilation, while a jump may last only a day or two, several weeks may have passed in real time, which is why many ships have cryo chambers, allowing their occupants to forestall the effects of aging, and minimize the need for crew supplies and quarters.
Slipspace can be thought of as our detectable universe (which, technically, it is) but with a greater number of dimensions. Our plane of existence is thought to have four dimensions (up-down, front-back, side-to-side and time), but Slipspace is an eleven-dimensional spacetime. Slipspace is currently theorized (in 2552) as a "tangle" of our plane's dimensions, rather like taking the classic "flat sheet" used to represent gravity and crumpling it up into a ball, thereby creating extra dimensions and shorter spaces between points. The slipstream also possesses different laws of physics than our "normal" universe, although some basic ones, such as energy transfer and momentum, remain the same.
The Slipspace drive (Translight Engine) generates a resonance field, which when coupled with the unusual physics of the Slipstream, allows for dramatically shorter transit times between stars; however, scientists note an odd "flexibility" to temporal flow while inside the Slipstream. Though no scientist is sure why travel time between stars is not constant, many theorize that there are "eddies" or "currents" within the Slipstream — there is generally a five to ten percent variance in travel times between stars. This temporal inconsistency has given military tacticians and strategists fits, hampering an uncounted number of coordinated attacks. Slipspace engines allow ships to leave normal space and plow through Slipspace. Slipspace drives use particle accelerators to rip apart normal space-time by generating micro black holes. These holes are evaporated via Hawking radiation in a nanosecond. The real quantum mechanical "magic" of the drive lies in how it manipulates these holes in space-time, squeezing vessels weighing thousands of tons into Slipspace.
The Covenant have a very finely tuned version of this technology, far superior to some other races Slipspace Drive. Instead of simply tearing a hole into Slipspace, Covenant Slipspace drives cut a very fine hole in the fabric of space-time and slips into Slipspace with precision (much like a scalpel compared to a butcher knife). It exits with the same pinpoint accuracy, takes less time while in jumps, and is able to plot a course with error not exceeding an atom.
Because the superfine quantum filaments the drives use to compute paths are disrupted by gravity, some vessels are incapable of transitioning while in any significant gravitational field. The Covenant's technology, though, is more than capable of computing Slipspace paths in gravitational fields, meaning that they are able to transition while in a gravity well.
Slipspace travel is dangerous due to the high level of radiation encountered during the trip, which can be extremely hazardous to the crew. Fissile materials also emit radiation (specifically Cherenkov radiation, emitted when particles travel through a medium at a faster rate than light travels in that same medium. Named after the Russian physicist Pavel Alekseyevich Cherenkov) upon exiting Slipspace; this is not harmful to Humans, however it does make emerging from Slipspace very noticeable. It is not known how the Covenant deal with radiation, but it is presumed that either they also utilize lead, or with their improved Slipspace technology and Energy shields, it does not affect them at all.
The concept of using an alternate dimension with different laws to travel faster than general relativity allows was first posited as the Minkowski Space Theory.
Subject: Faster then Light drive Systems (WIP) 
Fri Feb 27, 2009 9:05 am
