![]() ![]() It is possible to go faster, as discovered by renegade pilot Tom Paris in the Voyager series, but speeds this great started to bend reality a little too much, and results in being absolutely everywhere all at once. These speeds are measured in warp factors, and go all the way up to warp 9.99. This creates a warp bubble, or field, around the vessel, which would distorts the local space-time continuum and allows for travel that would not normally be permitted by the laws of physics. In Star Trek, the main fuel is created by burning both matter (in this case deuterium, a type of hydrogen gas) and antimatter in a fusion reactor, controlled carefully through the mediation of dilithium crystals. Of course, it would make sense that for a futuristic civilization they would also have a futuristic power source. To do this requires an immense amount of power. Audiences may hear the term frequently, but how exactly does it work? The writers of Star Trek needed a solution so that each episode was not just a slow moving jaunt through space twiddling their thumbs in the holodeck, and to close the vast distances between star systems, and thus Warp Drive (or Hyperdrive as it was classed in the pilot episode) was born. Captain Kathryn Janeway's journey to bring her crew home from the Delta Quadrant took an estimated 70 years, not including pit stops and detours along the way. The crew of the USS Voyager understand this all too well. Traversing it even with warp drive technology can take weeks to months - and that’s just from traveling between two fairly close star systems. The second reason behind the importance of the warp drive even simpler: space is really, really big. RELATED: How Star Trek: The Next Generation Explored Blindness & Accessibility With Geordi LaForge It also acts as a significant marker for a culture being advanced enough to handle the wealth of technology and information shareable by the federation, without it skewing the culture's natural evolution. ![]() The reason behind this is rather simple: if a species is able to traverse the universe more easily, they will eventually run into alien species, so they may as well introduce themselves. One is that it acts as an important marker for First Contact between the Federation (or the Vulcans before the Federation was formed) and the developing culture. The Warp Drive is fundamental for two distinct reasons. The Warp Drive's Role In The Star Trek Franchise The technology, of course, is the Warp Drive, and acts as an important cornerstone within the vast Star Trek history. Without it, there wouldn’t be much of a show at all, and those such as Kirk and Picard would be extremely limited in exploring the miraculously empty Milky Way. One such incredible piece of tech sits at the very heart of Star Trek. The universe created by the wonderful mind of Gene Roddenberry back in the late 1960s contains a myriad of wacky and wonderful things, from fabulous diverse alien races, to a dizzying array of futuristic technology.
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