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October 15, 2019 07:00 am

NASA Engineer's 'Helical Engine' May Violate Laws of Physics

NASA engineer David Burns posted a paper describing the concept of his "helical engine," which could take humans to the stars by exploiting mass-altering effects known to occur at near-light speed. Unfortunately, it's been met with skepticism from those who say it violates the conservation of momentum, a core physical law. New Scientist explains: To get to grips with the principle of Burns's engine, picture a box on a frictionless surface. Inside that box is a rod, along which a ring can slide. If a spring inside the box gives the ring a push, the ring will slide along the rod one way while the box will recoil in the other. When the ring reaches the end of the box, it will bounce backwards, and the box's recoil direction will switch too. This is action-reaction -- also known as Newton's third law of motion -- and in normal circumstances, it restricts the box to wiggling back and forth. But, Burns asks, what if the ring's mass is much greater when it slides in one direction than the other? Then it would give the box a greater kick at one end than the other. Action would exceed reaction and the box would accelerate forwards. Martin Tajmar at the Dresden University of Technology in Germany, who has performed tests on the EM Drive, believes the helical engine will probably suffer the same problem. "All inertial propulsion systems -- to my knowledge -- never worked in a friction-free environment," he says. This machine makes use of special relativity, unlike the others, which complicates the picture, he says, but "unfortunately there is always action-reaction." Burns has worked on his design in private, without any sponsorship from NASA, and he admits his concept is massively inefficient. However, he says there is potential to harvest much of the energy that the accelerator loses in heat and radiation. He also suggests ways that momentum could be conserved, such as in the spin of the accelerated ions. "I know that it risks being right up there with the EM drive and cold fusion," he says. "But you have to be prepared to be embarrassed. It is very difficult to invent something that is new under the sun and actually works."

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