liked their combination of hard science and practical technologies. She even felt that it was good they had a military training aspect, and that cadets were considered military officers while in training. She wasn't sure about having to serve a military obligation, but then she saw that students on academic scholarship were treated as reserve officers instead of having to serve for a service term. It was only those students that were attending on a military scholarship that had to serve a term. Even if she had wanted to do that, she suspected that with her physical condition she would not have been accepted to serve. But there was no way she could afford to attend without a scholarship of some type. She didn't have any idea how to go about applying for an academic scholarship. It would probably take months, even if she could get one, and what would she do during that time?
Some of the other local schools had good programs too, but nothing like the Space Academy. They just could not get her interest. Not that she had a clue what she could do about any of it.
Miranda knew that modern education had drastically improved for her generation. School years were more compressed than they used to be. They still got breaks, but not the extended summer-long breaks they used to get. By the age of 16, most kids would be graduating from high school. Secondly, they had compressed university level course work into six terms instead of eight. Most university's classes went right through the summer, too. So an average student could graduate in two years. Miranda had checked on her high school, and she had seen that she had just completed her high school work right before her accident. Based on her work she had completed in the hospital VR system, she believed that she could test out for her beginning classes. That meant that she could probably complete her work in a single calendar year, three terms.
She had discovered that she had an interest in Astrophysics. Scientists had really changed their view of the universe in the last half-century or so. First, it had been determined that not enough ordinary matter could be detected to explain the gravitational effects within the galaxies. Physicists had invented the concept of dark matter to handle this missing gravitational effect. However, after considering the amount of ordinary matter and dark matter, the calculated effects of those gravitational effects should be decreasing the rate of expansion of the universe, but instead the latest measurements seemed to indicate the rate of expansion of the universe was increasing. Scientists invented the concept of dark energy to explain this effect.
Neither dark matter nor dark energy had ever been detected by scientists despite considerable efforts directed toward finding them. Miranda had an idea that maybe both of these could be explained by the structure of the universe instead of undetected particles and some strange form of energy. Miranda's idea was that dark matter was the effect from an accumulation of the fabric of the universe, what Miranda named the subspace fabric. This effect would somehow be related to the amount of mass in the area of space. The dark energy relationship appeared to be the opposite effect when the lack of gravity in the large areas of empty space between galaxies allowed the subspace fabric to become thinner. The thinner it became as space expanded, the stronger the force became.
Miranda wondered if a properly manipulated superconductive electromagnetic field such as that used by Space Tech for their fusion reactor could be used on a much smaller scale to produce a tiny change in the subspace fabric that could be detected as a corresponding tiny increased gravitational effect. This would allow her to demonstrate the properties of the subspace fabric.
The other big question mark in the understanding of the universe was related to antimatter. When the universe was first created, it should have contained both matter and
Some of the other local schools had good programs too, but nothing like the Space Academy. They just could not get her interest. Not that she had a clue what she could do about any of it.
Miranda knew that modern education had drastically improved for her generation. School years were more compressed than they used to be. They still got breaks, but not the extended summer-long breaks they used to get. By the age of 16, most kids would be graduating from high school. Secondly, they had compressed university level course work into six terms instead of eight. Most university's classes went right through the summer, too. So an average student could graduate in two years. Miranda had checked on her high school, and she had seen that she had just completed her high school work right before her accident. Based on her work she had completed in the hospital VR system, she believed that she could test out for her beginning classes. That meant that she could probably complete her work in a single calendar year, three terms.
She had discovered that she had an interest in Astrophysics. Scientists had really changed their view of the universe in the last half-century or so. First, it had been determined that not enough ordinary matter could be detected to explain the gravitational effects within the galaxies. Physicists had invented the concept of dark matter to handle this missing gravitational effect. However, after considering the amount of ordinary matter and dark matter, the calculated effects of those gravitational effects should be decreasing the rate of expansion of the universe, but instead the latest measurements seemed to indicate the rate of expansion of the universe was increasing. Scientists invented the concept of dark energy to explain this effect.
Neither dark matter nor dark energy had ever been detected by scientists despite considerable efforts directed toward finding them. Miranda had an idea that maybe both of these could be explained by the structure of the universe instead of undetected particles and some strange form of energy. Miranda's idea was that dark matter was the effect from an accumulation of the fabric of the universe, what Miranda named the subspace fabric. This effect would somehow be related to the amount of mass in the area of space. The dark energy relationship appeared to be the opposite effect when the lack of gravity in the large areas of empty space between galaxies allowed the subspace fabric to become thinner. The thinner it became as space expanded, the stronger the force became.
Miranda wondered if a properly manipulated superconductive electromagnetic field such as that used by Space Tech for their fusion reactor could be used on a much smaller scale to produce a tiny change in the subspace fabric that could be detected as a corresponding tiny increased gravitational effect. This would allow her to demonstrate the properties of the subspace fabric.
The other big question mark in the understanding of the universe was related to antimatter. When the universe was first created, it should have contained both matter and
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