-Wormhole
A wormhole (or Einstein–Rosen bridge or Einstein–Rosen wormhole) is a speculative
structure linking disparate points in spacetime, and is based on a special solution of the
Einstein field equations. A wormhole can be visualized as a tunnel with two ends at separate
points in spacetime (i.e., different locations, or different points in time, or both).
Wormholes are consistent with the general theory of relativity, but whether wormholes
actually exist remains to be seen. Many scientists postulate wormholes are merely a
projection of a fourth spatial dimension, analogous to how a two-dimensional (2D) being
could experience only part of a three-dimensional (3D) object.[1]
A wormhole could connect extremely long distances such as a billion light years or more,
short distances such as a few meters, different universes, or different points in time.
Faster-than-light travel
The improbability of faster-than-light relative speed only applies locally. Wormholes might
allow effective superluminal (faster-than-light) travel by ensuring that the speed of light is
not exceeded locally at any time. While traveling through a wormhole, subluminal (slower-
than-light) speeds are used. If two points are connected by a wormhole whose length is
shorter than the distance between them outside the wormhole, the time taken to traverse it
could be less than the time it would take a light beam to make the journey if it took a path
through the space outside the wormhole. However, a light beam traveling through the same
wormhole would beat the traveler.
Traversable wormholes
Lorentzian traversable wormholes would allow travel in both directions from one part of the
universe to another part of that same universe very quickly or would allow travel from one
universe to another. The possibility of traversable wormholes in general relativity was first
demonstrated in a 1973 paper by Homer Ellis[31] and independently in a 1973 paper by K.
A. Bronnikov.[32] Ellis analyzed the topology and the geodesics of the Ellis drainhole,
showing it to be geodesically complete, horizonless, singularity-free, and fully traversable in
both directions. The drainhole is a solution manifold of Einstein's field equations for a
vacuum space-time, modified by inclusion of a scalar field minimally coupled to the Ricci
tensor with antiorthodox polarity (negative instead of positive). (Ellis specifically rejected
referring to the scalar field as 'exotic' because of the antiorthodox coupling, finding
arguments for doing so unpersuasive.) The solution depends on two parameters: m, which
fixes the strength of its gravitational field, and n, which determines the curvature of its
spatial cross sections. When m is set equal to 0, the drainhole's gravitational field vanishes.
What is left is the Ellis wormhole, a nongravitating, purely geometric, traversable wormhole.
Wormholes connect two points in spacetime, which means that they would in principle
allow travel in time, as well as in space. In 1988, Morris, Thorne and Yurtsever worked out
how to convert a wormhole traversing space into one traversing time by accelerating one of
its two mouths.[20] However, according to general relativity, it would not be possible to use
a wormhole to travel back to a time earlier than when the wormhole was first converted
into a time "machine". Until this time it could not have been noticed or have been used.
Time travel
If traversable wormholes exist, they could allow time travel.[20] A proposed time-travel
machine using a traversable wormhole would hypothetically work in the following way: One
end of the wormhole is accelerated to some significant fraction of the speed of light,
perhaps with some advanced propulsion system, and then brought back to the point of
origin. Alternatively, another way is to take one entrance of the wormhole and move it to
within the gravitational field of an object that has higher gravity than the other entrance,
and then return it to a position near the other entrance. For both these methods, time
dilation causes the end of the wormhole that has been moved to have aged less, or become
"younger", than the stationary end as seen by an external observer; however, time connects
differently through the wormhole than outside it, so that synchronized clocks at either end
of the wormhole will always remain synchronized as seen by an observer passing through
the wormhole, no matter how the two ends move around.[26]:502 This means that an
observer entering the "younger" end would exit the "older" end at a time when it was the
same age as the "younger" end, effectively going back in time as seen by an observer from
the outside. One significant limitation of such a time machine is that it is only possible to go
as far back in time as the initial creation of the machine;[26]:503 It is more of a path through
time rather than it is a device that itself moves through time, and it would not allow the
technology itself to be moved backward in time.
According to current theories on the nature of wormholes, construction of a traversable
wormhole would require the existence of a substance with negative energy, often referred
to as "exotic matter". More technically, the wormhole spacetime requires a distribution of
energy that violates various energy conditions, such as the null energy condition along with
the weak, strong, and dominant energy conditions. However, it is known that quantum
effects can lead to small measurable violations of the null energy condition,[7]:101 and
many physicists believe that the required negative energy may actually be possible due to
the Casimir effect in quantum physics.
In 1993, Matt Visser argued that the two mouths of a wormhole with such an induced clock
difference could not be brought together without inducing quantum field and gravitational
effects that would either make the wormhole collapse or the two mouths repel each other,
[43] or otherwise prevent information from passing through the wormhole.[44] Because of
this, the two mouths could not be brought close enough for causality violation to take place.
However, in a 1997 paper, Visser hypothesized that a complex "Roman ring" (named after
Tom Roman) configuration of an N number of wormholes arranged in a symmetric polygon
could still act as a time machine, although he concludes that this is more likely a flaw in
classical quantum gravity theory rather than proof that causality violation is possible.[45]
Causality - Causality is the relationship between causes and effects. From the perspective of
physics, it is generally believed that causality cannot occur between an effect and an event
that is not in the back (past) light cone of said effect. Similarly, a cause could not have an
effect outside its front (future) light cone.
