What would a wormhole look like from the inside?

[member 656954]

I'm working on the sequel to 'Guardian', and have my (somewhat) hero traversing a wormhole. Which got me wondering, what does it look like from the inside? Movies often depict flashing lights or a tunnel of some kind. I suspect Interstellar might be the standout for accuracy, but that's only a thought.

For the purpose of my plot, the wormhole opens at the originating end for a short period - seconds to tens of seconds, this process chews up massive amounts of energy and the opening collapses without energy input - and the traversing object is pushed into the wormhole. The destination end opens instantaneously in real space as soon as the originating end opens, so zero time passes in our universe between the two ends opening and closing.

However, time passes for those within this traversable macroscopic wormhole during the transit, with movement through the wormhole automatic because the inserted object (a ship in my novel) is "...caught up by the expanding pilot wave propagation as the wormhole burrowed into virtual dimensions and then exploded back into our universe."

Initially I considered that there was no EM radiation within the wormhole, only gravity, but I'm not sure that even makes sense. I guess baryon matter could exist in a space-time without EM radiation, but I prefer my sci-fi to have some basis in the probable, even if it's speculative.

So, two questions really.

1. Has the interior of a wormhole been topologically mapped and visualized outside of a movie?
2. Does a space-time without EM radiation make any sense?

Thanks,
Tghu

 

[Andrew Mason]

You might wish to direct your interesting questions to this fellow: Prof. Andrew Hamilton at the Dept. of Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences at the University of Colorado. He has visualized black holes and worm holes using a tool he developed which he calls "The Black Hole Flight Simulator". I look forward to seeing the movie!.

AM

 

[member 656954]

Thank you Andrew Mason that link is perfect. I've toyed with the interior being a black-body at 20K for no specific reason than that makes it dark and cold which works with the plot, but Prof. Andrew Hamilton's visualization is way more interesting!

 

[stevebd1]

You might also find this interesting-

https://www.spacetimetravel.org/wurmlochflug/wurmlochflug.html

 

[member 656954]

Thanks stevebd1, I did find that interesting, and literally enlightening such that I'm mentally tweaking the descriptive passage in the novel to include the 'other end' of the wormhole being visible. Regards, Tghu

 

[essenmein]

I kind of wonder if you would "see" the worm hole, or would you simply "see" the thing that is making the worm hole?

I have a jump drive in a story I'm writing, also essentially worm hole drive, uses einstein rosen bridge theory. However the ships need to generate a v large EM field to initiate the jump, and maintain a bubble of "normal" space around the ship while in the worm hole since "outside" is not part of our "space", not sure if that makes physics sense? basically what's "outside" the worm hole?

The way I'm handling the what it looks like aspect is what you as an occupant of the ship "sees" is just the photons emitted by the EM shield while its holding out the worm hole "outside", this outside would do very bad things should that field collapse.

Also those photons emitted by the EM shield is kind of ominous looking as its another dimension trying to squeeze us out, so in the ships we have basically screen savers that come on so you don't have to look at it for hours or days lol.

 

[member 656954]

The link that stevebd1 posted in #4 shows there is no 'interior' view, merely the endpoint view, but that's pretty boring for a story, right essenmein

And there is a definitely a wormhole trope where conditions are inimical when you are traversing one, and also the 'ominous' aspect you mention, so going with that fits into a rich narrative that sci-fi readers would well expect to see. I like the need for a large EM field to trigger the jump, gives you scope for plot tension in terms of recharging the accumulators (or whatever powers the ship), and the bubble likewise gives you scope for damage or loss of the bubble to trigger some tense 'will they or won't they' sequences.

Wormholes are decidedly fun to write about, that's for sure!

 

[essenmein]

The link that stevebd1 posted in #4 shows there is no 'interior' view, merely the endpoint view, but that's pretty boring for a story, right essenmein

And there is a definitely a wormhole trope where conditions are inimical when you are traversing one, and also the 'ominous' aspect you mention, so going with that fits into a rich narrative that sci-fi readers would well expect to see. I like the need for a large EM field to trigger the jump, gives you scope for plot tension in terms of recharging the accumulators (or whatever powers the ship), and the bubble likewise gives you scope for damage or loss of the bubble to trigger some tense 'will they or won't they' sequences.

Wormholes are decidedly fun to write about, that's for sure!

Yeah I've been sort of thinking about this quite a bit, I'd seen that video of travel "through a worm hole" as well as the simulations of what it "would" look like approaching the speed of light. (interestingly the same website above https://www.spacetimetravel.org/ueberblick/ueberblick1.html)

The way I've been reconciling "jump drive" with "worm hole" is that a worm hole is fully developed, ie both sides are "open" at the same time, whereas the jump drive is essentially an incomplete worm hole (energy reasons?), now bear in mind I have no mathematical basis for this, please correct if utterly wrong!

The way I explain it in the story at least is if you imagine our universe was a 2 D plane, then the jump drive is analogous to projectile motion in the 3rd dimension, so to travel from point A to B, you travel in a bubble of "normal space" held by this EM field in sort of a parabolic arc in this dimension. So you basically "launch" yourself into the other dimension at point A and fall back into our space at point B. Nonsense or semi plausible?

 

[member 656954]

The way I've been reconciling "jump drive" with "worm hole" is that a worm hole is fully developed, ie both sides are "open" at the same time, whereas the jump drive is essentially an incomplete worm hole (energy reasons?), now bear in mind I have no mathematical basis for this, please correct if utterly wrong!

That seems reasonable, and pretty much how I'm approaching my wormhole (and jump drive that appears down the track in the series) but as for mathematical basis, I think it is worth keeping that 'inferred' as much as possible. Your 2D/3D description is definitely plausible but honestly, if your prose is getting so deep into describing realistic math you're likely going to lose reader interest. I love hard sci-fi, but never expect it to include equations

 

[essenmein]

That seems reasonable, and pretty much how I'm approaching my wormhole (and jump drive that appears down the track in the series) but as for mathematical basis, I think it is worth keeping that 'inferred' as much as possible. Your 2D/3D description is definitely plausible but honestly, if your prose is getting so deep into describing realistic math you're likely going to lose reader interest. I love hard sci-fi, but never expect it to include equations

Heh, I have not yet busted out microsoft's equation editor!

I figure get the "laws" of operation sorted out clearly so in the story they are approached consistently over time, to avoid, for example, the situation where there is a new "quirk" with how the drive works later in the story purely for plot reasons.

 

[member 656954]

I figure get the "laws" of operation sorted out clearly so in the story they are approached consistently over time, to avoid, for example, the situation where there is a new "quirk" with how the drive works later in the story purely for plot reasons.

Awesome. Worse type of story is where stuff happens 'just because.' It is so transparent...and so annoying. I'm reading an EOTWAWKI story at the moment - grinding my way through it, really - and it is full of WTF triggers because the author was clearly making it up as he's going along, so I fully endorse getting the "laws" clear in your mind from the start.

 

[rekoj]

A wormhole at least to me logically would be completely black since space-time is completely warped and the visible light spectrum is completely diffracted.

 

[member 656954]

A wormhole at least to me logically would be completely black since space-time is completely warped and the visible light spectrum is completely diffracted.

Can't quite picture that - and I get the irony in that statement - but seriously asking how that would work? If there is a complete spacetime warp and EM diffraction, what protects our 3D-universe objects within the wormhole?