Science of Star Trek: Transporters

Prof. Lawrence Krauss, author of "The Physics of Star Trek" explains the physics behind Star Trek's transporter systems, and why the Heisenberg compensators are a really handy thing.

Tempe Center for the Arts, BEYOND center, ASU

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• physics
• star
• trek
• transporter
• beyond
• asu
• heisenberg
• compensator
• astrophysics
• aviation
• space
• electronics

[ShinobiGarth]

it takes far too much energy to convert matter into energy, so transporting isnt really feasible unless we find a way around that

[luminositymusic]

What

[luminositymusic]

Really?

[MrChronified]

Just to clearify a few things. Some of the finer points on the theoritical operation of the transporter are touched on in the TNG tech manual. So, a Transporter is NOT a teleporter. It does not destroy matter and create a copy. Using annular confinement a spatial matrix is made(additional fields DO hold you in place, same time)Molecular Imaging Scanners provide analog quantum state data w/ the help of the heisenberg compensators(anybodies guess how they actually work)

[drnekodr]

Where is the whole thing?!! I wanna see the rest of it!

[jimjimthehumanbin]

@PtAltmVansanTarr like the anime/manga 'Ghost in the Shell'. In a way you would become immortal if you could upload your 'soul' to a form of inter/intranet.

[jimjimthehumanbin]

couldn't you be physically frozen in a temporary stasis or something, this snapshot is scanned and the information transferred to another pod (that is also frozen) and brought out of stasis/frozen state. just throwing around ideas. edinburgh uni are working on light hard drives to store info so it won't be long before we have organic computers to handle large calculations.

[PtAltmVansanTarr]

We will be able to upload our brains to the 'net and thus won't need this kind of tech--we will constantly replicate the real universe as it is discovered by robots on the 'net universe, thus we will see the "real world" up to date. It's estimated by 2020 we will be able to do this,which also means--the odds are we are likely in a kind of simulator right now!!

[UNDATHESPEL]

@pillsareyummy My previous statement about reference to teleportation in

Professor Shu's book ' The Physical Universe ' may be incorrect. I looked through this book once again to see if i could find the reference, but have not been able to

do so. I felt sure I had read of such a reference in this book, but it seems I could

be mistaken. If I have been mistaken I apologize for this error.

[UNDATHESPEL]

@pillsareyummy Is matter destroyed in the process of teleportation, and new

matter created? That is a complete unknown at this moment in time. We shall

have to wait and see. But if matter is destroyed in this process, is it important?

Remember matter on the sub-atomic level would be destroyed and recreated

in the human body all the time, it does not seem to be a problem.