Can Anything Go Faster Than Light?

LIVE SCIENCE www.LiveScience.com CAN ANYTHING GO FASTER THAN LIGHT? THE STARSHIP ENTERPRISE ACCELERATES PAST THE SPEED OF LIGHT IN STAR TREK (2009) Light is known to travel through a vacuum at 186,282.4 miles per second (about 700 million miles per hour, or 300 million meters per second). Why can't you travel faster? For more than 100 years, Albert Einstein's special theory of relativity has ruled out the possibility of anything breaking the ultimate speed limit. E-mc NEUTRINO EXPERIMENT Scientists at the European Organization For Nuclear Research (CERN) designed an experiment called OPERA(1), to CERN SWITZERLAND study the behavior of subatomic particles called neutrinos. ITALY These particles rarely interact with normal matter, so they pass straight through the Gran Sasso Earth as if it were a vacuum. Signals from orbiting GPS satellites were used to precisely measure times and distances during the experiment Rome 100 mi 100 km Scientists shot a beam of neutrinos hundreds Neutrino beam Data showed that the neutrinos were of miles through the crust of the Earth, traveled up to 7.08 miles (11.4 km) below the surface of the Earth arriving at the detectors 60 billionths of a second earlier than if they were from Geneva to a laboratory in Italy traveling at exactly the speed of light Distance: 454 miles (730 km) Gran Sasso National Laboratory CERN Oscillation Project with Emulsion-tRacking Apparatus: OPERA(1) KARL TATE / © LiveScience.com SOURCES: EUROPEAN ORGANIZATION FOR NUCLEAR RESEARCH (CERN), U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY. STAR TREK IS © CBS STUDIOS LIVE SCIENCE www.LiveScience.com CAN ANYTHING GO FASTER THAN LIGHT? THE STARSHIP ENTERPRISE ACCELERATES PAST THE SPEED OF LIGHT IN STAR TREK (2009) Light is known to travel through a vacuum at 186,282.4 miles per second (about 700 million miles per hour, or 300 million meters per second). Why can't you travel faster? For more than 100 years, Albert Einstein's special theory of relativity has ruled out the possibility of anything breaking the ultimate speed limit. E-mc NEUTRINO EXPERIMENT Scientists at the European Organization For Nuclear Research (CERN) designed an experiment called OPERA(1), to CERN SWITZERLAND study the behavior of subatomic particles called neutrinos. ITALY These particles rarely interact with normal matter, so they pass straight through the Gran Sasso Earth as if it were a vacuum. Signals from orbiting GPS satellites were used to precisely measure times and distances during the experiment Rome 100 mi 100 km Scientists shot a beam of neutrinos hundreds Neutrino beam Data showed that the neutrinos were of miles through the crust of the Earth, traveled up to 7.08 miles (11.4 km) below the surface of the Earth arriving at the detectors 60 billionths of a second earlier than if they were from Geneva to a laboratory in Italy traveling at exactly the speed of light Distance: 454 miles (730 km) Gran Sasso National Laboratory CERN Oscillation Project with Emulsion-tRacking Apparatus: OPERA(1) KARL TATE / © LiveScience.com SOURCES: EUROPEAN ORGANIZATION FOR NUCLEAR RESEARCH (CERN), U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY. STAR TREK IS © CBS STUDIOS LIVE SCIENCE www.LiveScience.com CAN ANYTHING GO FASTER THAN LIGHT? THE STARSHIP ENTERPRISE ACCELERATES PAST THE SPEED OF LIGHT IN STAR TREK (2009) Light is known to travel through a vacuum at 186,282.4 miles per second (about 700 million miles per hour, or 300 million meters per second). Why can't you travel faster? For more than 100 years, Albert Einstein's special theory of relativity has ruled out the possibility of anything breaking the ultimate speed limit. E-mc NEUTRINO EXPERIMENT Scientists at the European Organization For Nuclear Research (CERN) designed an experiment called OPERA(1), to CERN SWITZERLAND study the behavior of subatomic particles called neutrinos. ITALY These particles rarely interact with normal matter, so they pass straight through the Gran Sasso Earth as if it were a vacuum. Signals from orbiting GPS satellites were used to precisely measure times and distances during the experiment Rome 100 mi 100 km Scientists shot a beam of neutrinos hundreds Neutrino beam Data showed that the neutrinos were of miles through the crust of the Earth, traveled up to 7.08 miles (11.4 km) below the surface of the Earth arriving at the detectors 60 billionths of a second earlier than if they were from Geneva to a laboratory in Italy traveling at exactly the speed of light Distance: 454 miles (730 km) Gran Sasso National Laboratory CERN Oscillation Project with Emulsion-tRacking Apparatus: OPERA(1) KARL TATE / © LiveScience.com SOURCES: EUROPEAN ORGANIZATION FOR NUCLEAR RESEARCH (CERN), U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY. STAR TREK IS © CBS STUDIOS LIVE SCIENCE www.LiveScience.com CAN ANYTHING GO FASTER THAN LIGHT? THE STARSHIP ENTERPRISE ACCELERATES PAST THE SPEED OF LIGHT IN STAR TREK (2009) Light is known to travel through a vacuum at 186,282.4 miles per second (about 700 million miles per hour, or 300 million meters per second). Why can't you travel faster? For more than 100 years, Albert Einstein's special theory of relativity has ruled out the possibility of anything breaking the ultimate speed limit. E-mc NEUTRINO EXPERIMENT Scientists at the European Organization For Nuclear Research (CERN) designed an experiment called OPERA(1), to CERN SWITZERLAND study the behavior of subatomic particles called neutrinos. ITALY These particles rarely interact with normal matter, so they pass straight through the Gran Sasso Earth as if it were a vacuum. Signals from orbiting GPS satellites were used to precisely measure times and distances during the experiment Rome 100 mi 100 km Scientists shot a beam of neutrinos hundreds Neutrino beam Data showed that the neutrinos were of miles through the crust of the Earth, traveled up to 7.08 miles (11.4 km) below the surface of the Earth arriving at the detectors 60 billionths of a second earlier than if they were from Geneva to a laboratory in Italy traveling at exactly the speed of light Distance: 454 miles (730 km) Gran Sasso National Laboratory CERN Oscillation Project with Emulsion-tRacking Apparatus: OPERA(1) KARL TATE / © LiveScience.com SOURCES: EUROPEAN ORGANIZATION FOR NUCLEAR RESEARCH (CERN), U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY. STAR TREK IS © CBS STUDIOS LIVE SCIENCE www.LiveScience.com CAN ANYTHING GO FASTER THAN LIGHT? THE STARSHIP ENTERPRISE ACCELERATES PAST THE SPEED OF LIGHT IN STAR TREK (2009) Light is known to travel through a vacuum at 186,282.4 miles per second (about 700 million miles per hour, or 300 million meters per second). Why can't you travel faster? For more than 100 years, Albert Einstein's special theory of relativity has ruled out the possibility of anything breaking the ultimate speed limit. E-mc NEUTRINO EXPERIMENT Scientists at the European Organization For Nuclear Research (CERN) designed an experiment called OPERA(1), to CERN SWITZERLAND study the behavior of subatomic particles called neutrinos. ITALY These particles rarely interact with normal matter, so they pass straight through the Gran Sasso Earth as if it were a vacuum. Signals from orbiting GPS satellites were used to precisely measure times and distances during the experiment Rome 100 mi 100 km Scientists shot a beam of neutrinos hundreds Neutrino beam Data showed that the neutrinos were of miles through the crust of the Earth, traveled up to 7.08 miles (11.4 km) below the surface of the Earth arriving at the detectors 60 billionths of a second earlier than if they were from Geneva to a laboratory in Italy traveling at exactly the speed of light Distance: 454 miles (730 km) Gran Sasso National Laboratory CERN Oscillation Project with Emulsion-tRacking Apparatus: OPERA(1) KARL TATE / © LiveScience.com SOURCES: EUROPEAN ORGANIZATION FOR NUCLEAR RESEARCH (CERN), U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY. STAR TREK IS © CBS STUDIOS