SCIENCE CATCHES UP TO SF--AGAIN!

And now, a few items to prove that real science is overtaking science fiction at an astounding rate.

Remember that scene in the episode of Star Trek, The Original Series, when Captain Kirk steps to a bank of receptacles in the wall and orders a chicken sandwich and coffee from the replicator (only to be served a plateful of fluffy Tribbles)? Well, a similar food reproduction system may be coming to an automat near you (without the furry interlopers, of course).

So close to replicator tech--just leave out the tribbles.

Catherine Lamb reports in TheSpoon.tech that the Israeli company Redefine Meat has developed a 3D printer that can produce a beef-like meat substance from plant-based materials. The company can build the printer for the relatively low cost of $100k. The idea would be to sell the machine, then supply the buyer (food distributors or producers, for example) with plant-based material packs to make the meat products. Currently Redefine Meat is focused on beef, but is researching how to create tuna, pork and other “flavors” as well.

Why stop there? “Replicated” vegetables and grains would be just as desirable in space, or even in isolated environments on earth where storage and/or refrigeration space is at a premium—the research stations at Antarctica, for example, or on remote islands. And imagine the advantages on the International Space Station, or if we establish an outpost on the moon or on Mars.

Of course, we Trekkers are not surprised that the writers who envisioned the cellphone, the iPad and the MRI would inspire yet another tech marvel. But, hey, I never really thought I would be clairvoyant when it came to the science in my books.

My Interstellar Rescue series characters use a system of stable wormholes to get around the galaxy. The entrances/exits to these tunnels in space/time are called Jump Nodes in the books and act on surrounding space like mini-black holes. In the series, one of these Jump Nodes exists on the very edge of our own solar system, hidden from our technology, but making Earth an easy target for the slave-trading bad-guy aliens. 

 

A stable wormhole--the jump node method of interstellar travel.

Well, guess what? Scientists have found a mysterious object they have tagged “Planet 9” in the outer reaches of our solar system. Some scientists believe the object may be what is known as a “primordial black hole,” that is, one formed in the aftermath of the Big Bang. The hole, if it exists, may be no bigger than a bowling ball and would not be detectable by visible-light or infrared telescopes. Scientists arguing for the existence of the object base their hypothesis on anomalies in the orbits of asteroids, comets and other bodies beyond Neptune, according to the report in NBCNews.com. The only problem is, no primordial black holes have ever been seen before, though they theoretically might exist.

An alternate explanation would be that a huge, undetected planet is causing the gravitational variations. Says a coauthor of the study, James Unwin of the University of Illinois at Chicago, “The discovery of a giant planet in the outer solar system would be an extraordinary discovery. But the discovery of a primordial black hole would be immense and even more spectacular.”

Yes. But a Jump Node leading to another, inhabited, sector of the galaxy? Well, that discovery would really blow our minds, now wouldn’t it? 

 HAPPY BOOK BIRTHDAYS TO MY CO-BLOGGERS 

Congratulations to both Sharon Lynn Fisher for the debut this week of The Absinthe Earl (The Faery Rehistory Series Book 1) and to Laurie Green and her co-authors for the fabulous success of Pets in Space® 4. If you haven’t gotten your copies of these great books (one a fantasy/alternate history romance, the other a continuation of the SFR series), better get in line.

Cheers, Donna

 Information for this post drawn from: "Redefine Meat Raises $6M for 3D Printed Meat   Alternatives." by Catherine Lamb, TheSpoon.tech, September 11, 2019.

"Our solar system's mysterious 'Planet 9' may actually be a tiny, ancient black hole," by Denise Chow, NBCNews.com, October 2, 2019.

A different take on interstellar travel

The concept of interplanetary travel is a very important aspect of any space opera, where popping around from planet to planet is an integral part of the action. Think Star Trek, Star Wars, Firefly and the like.And, of course, my SF books.

Several years ago I wrote an article explaining my notion of interplanetary travel, which involved taking advantage of dimensions beyond our height, width, and depth geometry. This is an excerpt from that article.

"Take a piece of A4 paper. Let’s label two diagonally opposite corners as A and B. Starting from B, we can reach A by going straight up one side then along the top to A. Hang on, you say, wouldn’t you just go across the diagonal, thereby reducing the distance and time taken? Sure you would. Now curl the paper over into a cylinder. All you have to do to get from B to A is move along a straight line. The length of the line will depend on how you make the roll (short edges together or long edges together).

Now take point A in one hand and point B in the other and bring them together so they meet. Getting from B to A in this instance is like walking from one room into another."

 You'll find the full article here.

Recently I've been reading Holly Lisle's books set in her Settled Space universe. She has taken this idea of foldable space to a whole new level. In space it's possible to travel vast distances by using origami points. In one section of Hunting the Corrigan's Blood the MC, Cadence Drake, watches an old vid of Isas Yamamoto explaining how his hyperspace drive works.

“Akiko wanted a crane,” Yamamoto said, smiling down at his little girl. 

“And I was folding it for her—like so.” 

He handed the finished crane to his daughter and took a sheet of paper from the little carved table beside him. He lifted it up and made a crease in the paper, and then another. While he folded it, he talked. 

“It occurred to me that the nature of origami, that is, the art of folding paper, was very much like the problem humanity faced in reaching the stars. Origami is folding two-dimensional paper into three-dimensional objects. Space travel through hyperspace is the folding of a three-dimensional universe into four spatial dimensions to shorten the distances between points.”   

He held up the partially finished crane. It didn’t look like much yet. “You see—I am taking something that was in essence two-dimensional, and I am changing it into something three-dimensional.”

 ***

To me, this is a delightful combination of the concept of worm holes through space with the folding of space through multiple dimensions. The paths are fixed, straight lines from one origami point to another.

But there's more to it than that.

Later in the same section, Yamamoto says,

"Life is not a thing of three dimensions. It is not limited by up and across and back. Life encompasses space, and time, and it goes beyond that. It touches infinity. You sit watching me right now, and in another probability, another child who is also you sits watching another me. In another probability, another child who is also you sits where you are sitting, but that child isn’t listening the way you are. 

In an infinite number of probabilities, an infinite number of children who are also you do an infinite number of things, and none of them can see or hear each other. So how can all of these yous do similar things? You are linked together through hyperspace. The infinite number of three-dimensional yous are all part of a single meta-you, whose home is hyperspace.”

 ***

And that is significant because when a person goes through an origami point, they encounter all those other yous. Here's the first instance we come across of Cadence's ship going through an origami point.

"Space, still and silent and serene, filled with stars that promise everything. Everything. Think of the perfection of space, the glorious swirl of a nebula splashed against the velvet dark—

“Six…five…four…three…”

I am Cadence Drake, captain and owner of the Hope’s Reward. 

“Two.”

I am strong. I know who I am. 

“One.”

I know what I believe.

“Insertion.”

I was no longer alone. In my chair, in my head, I could feel the rest of myself, the multidimensional self that takes its mundane shapes as an infinite number of Cadence Drakes in an infinite number of universes connected by the fact that we are one. Infinite. Of a magnitude with the heavens. And we are more than infinite mirrored and fragmented parts; we are also a single whole. An Entity. We touch, we mirror, we remain Me through that portion of our self, or perhaps I should say Self, that has its home in hyperspace. A part of me can look infinity in the eye and not flinch. A part of me is enormous and magnificent and beyond the pain and the suffering and the despair of my infinite mirrored fragmented mortal three-dimensional lives; is so beyond my limitations and weaknesses and frailties that it regards the infinite parts of me with some tenderness but also with mild, superior amusement.  I am small, puny, insignificant. Mortal. Human. A creature of limited flesh and limited intellect, for a burning expanse of non-time forced to see myself not only as I am, but as I could be in all my infinite capacity, knowing that when the moment ends my sudden wisdom, my godhood, will be stripped from me and I will be thrown naked and shivering and frightened and mortal back into the domain of death.

And the infinite frightened fragments of my greater Self clamor in my head. I am a doctor, on my way to a new world, armed with hope and knowledge, but now fear, too, for I have never taken this shortcut through the stars. I am a dancer; and I am a thief; and a renegade and a lover and a mother and I am old and young and I have a thousand faces and a thousand names a million names a billion names and I know them all all all all and every detail of every life that goes with them and they are nothing nothing nothing because these fragments of my true self are nothing these tiny mortal scraps are meaningless are nothing but I am Cadence Drake I am Cadence Drake I am Cadence Drake— “

—I am Cadence Drake—”

 ***

This pull of the multi-verse happens every single time a person goes through an origami point. Which is why most people are placed in a form of suspended animation for the few moments it takes to go through. Ship's captains, however, have to be awake, aware and in control.

It's such a powerful image. Lisle uses this downside of space travel as an arc in her stories, not so much for the crossing itself but what goes through Cadence's head as she traverses the point. All the regrets, all the possibilities, all the 'if onlys'.

For most authors, real space disappears in hyperspace. We all remember the stream of stars in the Millenium Falcon's front screen. Other people imagine it as grey and formless. My shift space is a bit more colourful than most. I imagine it as a kaleidoscope, rather like those we played with as kids.

But this mental twist to inter-stellar travel is a new one to me. 

From a writing craft perspective, I also admired the way Lisle avoided an info-dump and explained what happens at origami poits as a narrative that is part of the story. We also learn a little about Cadence's history through this device. It's woth taking notes.

For readers, it's a space opera thriller and I loved it. You'll find my review of Hunting the Corrigan's Blood here.

Quotes from Lisle, Holly. Hunting the Corrigan's Blood (A Cadence Drake Novel Book 1) . Holly Lisle. Kindle Edition.