Light is a Quantum Pressure Wave?

 I've been writing a new book, made up so far of mini-papers, but I've been sticking them all together and two of the bits taken together are pretty exciting so I'm writing a paper on that. The paper has four steps to it:

Step 1. Thesis. I've shown that light looks like a sound wave in the quantum background. When you assume that, it predicts a speed that agrees with the speed of light within 10%, which is the uncertainty of some of the parameters I'm using anyway. So that was my initial observational test and it passed.

Step 2. Based GR. If you apply quantised inertia to this, you get the equation for the propagation of light from general relativity. It predicts general relativistic effects not from curved spacetime, but from the inhomogeneity of the quantum background around matter. This is a much more scientific model than curved space because you can see both the effect (light bending) and in principle also the cause of it (inhomogeneities in the quantum background).

Step 3. A Test. This model predicts that if you fire a laser through a cavity then the light should slow down. That is a test that can be done quite easily and as I recall was done by Harold White once. He fired a laser through an emdrive just for the heck of it and saw anomalous results.

Step 4. Application. What this means is that by engineering the vacuum (not sure how yet) we should be able to increase the speed of light and travel faster than the usual light speed limit. Perhaps this already happens in some parts of deep space?

If I can get this past the reviewers or censors this will be a great paper. It represents conceptual progress, but is also testable and applicable. If I can't publish it that way, I'll just go to Plan B and continue with the book. It was supposed to be about time, but that's a concept so big to think about, that a lot of other things are dropping out along the way.

A Tale of Two Satellites

In March 2025 SpaceX launched a Rogue Space Systems cubesat with an IVO Ltd Quantum (QI) Drive on it. Up till Christmas I was monitoring its trajectory, almost every day and it did seem to push up by about a few metres when it seemed from personal communications that they had turned it on, but analyses like this are very subjective.

Unfortunately, as you may know, there was a engineering glitch so the thruster could not be turned on for more than a minute before problems arose, so the hoped-for orbit raise of kilometers did not come to pass. Which leaves us in a less than ideal position. Can we see if there is QI thrust? We probably cannot do this for certain, but I collected a lot of data from SatNOGS DB (nearly every day for several months) so it makes sense to see what we can get from it.

They always say "Don't compare yourself with others," but in science that is a valid method. One thing we can do is to use a control: a similar satellite without a QI drive. The IVO Sat (Norad ID = 63235) had a close twin brother (Norad ID = 63220) which was the same shape and mass and was launched by the same Falcon 9 rocket into about the same orbit. So, we can look at their fall over the last three months and see if the IVO Sat fell less than the control satellite. IVOsat fell from 506.3 km on 30/9/25 to 501.42 km on 30/12/25, a fall of 4880 metres. The other satellite fell from 504.98 km to 499.5 km so a fall of 5480 metres. Therefore the IVOsat fell 600 metres less over three months. Does that mean the QI Drive thrust it up by 600 meters over that time? Possibly. Is that the rise we expect give the thrusting they did?

The thrust generated by the QI quantum drive was expected to be 1.75 mN and the mass of the satellite is 20 kg which means that the along track acceleration (a) will be

a = F/mass = 0.00175/20 = 8.75x10^-5 m/s^2

Since I happen to know that the typical burn time was about a minute, and if we assume it was fired once every other day, a reasonable guess, then the change in speed per day (dv) is

dv = 8.75x10^-5 x 60 /2 = 0.002625 m/s

The change in height (dH) is

dH = 2.dv.sqrt(r^3/GM) = 5 metres per day

The observed rise (compared to its twin) was 600 metres in 90 days, which is 6.6 metres per day. Therefore the IVOsat moved up relative to its twin satellite by about the height you might expect if the Quantum Drive was being fired every other day for one minute on average. It looks plausible, but it could be that the drive was generating a Lorentz force and pushing off the Earth's magnetic field. My calculation of the Lorentz force suggests it's too small but I do not have detailed knowledge of the circuitry in the drive. We had hoped to have thrust large enough to avoid ambiguities like this but that has not been the case.

If this QI Quantum Drive was indeed thrusting then it means a radical change to the entire satellite industry because we can now have onboard thrusters that are silent and do not need to carry heavy fuel so they will last much longer, but we are not in a position to say that yet. Anyway, a big thank you to IVO Ltd, Rogue Space Systems and SpaceX who got the test up there (an amazing feat in itself) and have produced some results. I hope they will soon make a more detailed press release on it.

Elephants in the Room (JuMBOs)

The fantastic news is that the journal Astronomy has just peer-reviewed, accepted and published my new paper on the Jupiter Mass Binary Objects (JuMBOs). Since it was an invited contribution I do not have to pay £1000 to make it open access.

As you know, quantised inertia predicts there is a minimum acceleration in nature of around 2x10^-10 m/s^2. This is such a small acceleration that it would take the lifetime of the universe to get from zero to the speed of light (there a big clue to something right there). How do we test this? Look where nature tests the limit. Stars at the edge of galaxies are doing that and move faster to stay above this minimum, that’s why they orbit faster than expected, not because they contain invisible dark matter. Galaxy clusters, wide binaries and even our nearest neighbour Proxima Centauri all hover just above this limit and these are all on different scales, thus proving that the reason is not dark matter since this has to be spread out specifically on galactic scales.

When a paper was published by McCaughrean and Pearson (2023) finding what looked like 42 wide binaries in the Orion nebula, I thought “I’ll bet they too hover just above the QI minimum.” Sure enough, when I checked, they did! QI never fails. Hence the plot below which shows the separation of each binary (x axis) against the orbital acceleration (y). As they get wider, they still stay above the minimum predicted by QI (red line, but see the caveat below).

I always have the confident feeling on testing QI that it is going to work, but it is still a great thrill when it does. There are a couple of data points that are strictly below the QI minimum but this minimum also has an uncertainty, mostly due to uncertainties in the cosmic scale.

In any good paper, there’s always a testable prediction and a caveat. The QI prediction is that the widest of these binary objects should be orbiting up to 70 metres per second faster than expected and this prediction could be tested by the HARPS (High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher) telescope which is used to spot exoplanets and can determine orbital speeds, they say, to an accuracy of 1 m/s. The main caveat is that we need to find more of these JuMBOs to be sure they are binary objects and not just coincident objects. Their being just random coincidence is very unlikely, as stated in the observational paper, because the line of sight points out of the galaxy so there isn't much situated behind them, but you know sceptics! I've been through quite a long, and useful, review process on this one so it's great to end the year with a success.

If you liked this, find much more at my patreon site: https://www.patreon.com/OneSteptoTauCeti

References

Pearson, S.G. and M.J. McCaughrean, 2023. Jupiter mass binary objects in the Trapezium cluster. https://arxiv.org/abs/2310.01231

McCulloch, M.E., 2026. Jupiter Mass Binary Objects Show a Minimum Acceleration. Astronomy, 5(1), 1. https://www.mdpi.com/2674-0346/5/1/1

3I/Atlas Bound?

This month's great leap forward is that I have written a fortran model to simulate complete QI dynamics for the first time. The great thing about having a fortran model is that you can run experiments with it. I've suspected for a while that these interstellar comets like Oumuamua, Borisov or 3I/Atlas are actually bound to the Solar system, or 3I/Atlas at least. This was based on little more than my QI intuition that objects at low acceleration, in other words out in the boondocks, tend to be bound when they are not supposed to be. This is because at low accelerations QI reduces the inertial mass and also the centrifugal force, so there's less tendency than expected for objects to go in straight lines and with a circular orbit, this means less tendency to veer off into deep space. Galactic edge stars and wide binaries are unexpectedly bound. Unexpected unless you know about QI.

As a test, I initialised 3I/Atlas at its perihelion, taking the data from the JPL Horizons website and then modelled it as it shot off into the outer solar system. With Newtonian physics it kept on going and was an interstellar comet as everyone expects. With QI, it first slowed down in its trajectory as it lost inertial mass and was more easily attracted back to the Sun, a bit like the Pioneer craft. This was very obvious after about 100 years. Then at about 1500 AU distance it came to a virtual stop and started on a very slow turn-aroud back to the Sun. On other words. Despite its present breakneck speed, of 68,000 m/s, it's bound and someday it will be back. This is as much of a shock to old physics as when Rutherford fired alpha particles at atoms in gold foil and saw them bounce back thus proving the existence of the hard central nucleus, or the day an Australian native threw away a bent stick and it came back and hit him on the head.

This realisation with QI that 3I/Atlas is bound solves so many of the problems that have been pointed out by Avi Loeb. It arrived in the plane of the ecliptic, and the random chance of that was very low. More importantly, 3I/Atlas is so massive: one million times the mass of the first 'interstellar' object Oumuamua and 1000 times the mass of Borisov. It is just crazy that we should see something so big. We should see 1000 Oumuamuas before we see one Borisov, and 1000 Borisovs before one 3I/Atlas. But 3I/Atlas is what it is. It would be a shock if there is so much mass in interstellar space. It is far easier to assume that 3I/Atlas is part of the Solar system, just coming in from the Oort cloud, if that exists. I suspect it might be closer in than expected. This accounts for it being in the ecliptic plane - it is just derived from the same condensed, flattened cloud that all the planets are, and its huge mass is no longer a mystery. I love simplifications, and QI always provides a few for free.

So is 3I/Atlas bound? Newton says no. QI says yes, and remember that the data is with QI in these low acceleration regimes. QI predicts galactic edge stars and wide binaries, whereas Newton does not without a ridiculous amount of arbitrary (dark) help. Anyway, this is bound to change our view of the Solar system.

The Sark Foundation

Well here's an update for you. For much more on all these topics, please see my patreon (link below). 

I'm part of a team submitting a proposal for a European Research Grant. I'm not getting that excited about it yet because, even if we get the funds, the work won't start till mid 2027, but it would be 10 million euros shared between four Principal Investigators. It involves trying to combine quantised inertia with a theory of time called 3d time. QI predicts that the time perceived by an object depends on the degree of interaction it has with its environment (no change = no time), so it predicts that time progresses differently for quantum systems (with few interactions), macro systems (lots of interactions) and cosmic systems (few interactions). Gunther Kletetschka's 3-d time kind of assumed that tripartite rule so there may be testable links there and also, I hope, more efficient ways to get to QI thrust.

I've co-written a new book with Ed Dutton on ancient civilisations, so let's see if the publisher accepts it. We're saying that every so often the Earth's magnetic field collapses causing havoc and cosmic dust.

The IVO satellite is still up there testing the QI quantum drive. As I said on X a while ago, something is going on that is encouraging, but I can't tell you anything. Bad news travels at light speed, good news is subject to NDAs. Nothing conclusive, but I'm pretty happy with the way it is going. The process has proven difficult, but that is not a surprise. There's a reason 'brain surgeon' and 'rocket scientist' are both used to refer to people who can do difficult things. IVO and Rogue are doing it.

What I'm doing at the moment is working on various theoretical papers and books. I've resubmitted the paper on how QI predicts the Jupiter Mass Binary Objects, written a paper deriving relativity from information theory and a paper deriving light as a sound wave on the quantum vacuum... It works!

I'm also revisiting the Floating Brick concept, and it occurred to me that there has already been an observation of something similar. This is in a paper by Linn et al. (2020) in which they warmed up two cubes containing photonic crystals to 575K (302degC). One with a uniform cross section and one with tungsten rods within, separated by about a micron. There was a difference. The block with the rods in it, emitted about 8 times the thermal radiation allowed by Planck's radiation law, far too much, and at the wavelength of the separation of the tungsten rods. This is what QI predicts for small cavities. As you confine information, heat must be released and in Linn's case it certainly was. I've been doing a calculation to predict what size of cavity you'd need to produce enough Unruh radiation for it to lift off, and, theoretically, it should be doable. The Floating Brick again!

I'm also writing a new sci-fi, this time explaining how QI would best be applied in a sort of Manhattan project, if, for example, a comet the size of 3I/Atlas was headed for Earth. I'm having fun writing it, probably because I've just promoted myself to head a large Scientific Foundation based on the island of Sark and we have just launched our first test 'LeviCube' into space.

For more updates like this please subscribe to my patreon: https://www.patreon.com/OneSteptoTauCeti

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References

Lin, SY., Hsieh, ML., John, S. et al. An In-situ and Direct Confirmation of Super-Planckian Thermal Radiation Emitted From a Metallic Photonic-Crystal at Optical Wavelengths. Sci Rep 10, 5209 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-62063-2

The Quantum Time Machine (A QI-Themed Short Story)

Dr Filius Apry had realised years ago, something that no-one else had: Heisenberg's uncertainty principle allows time travel. Well... sort of. To avoid bothering you with the maths, the principle can be written like this

(uncertainty in time) x (uncertainty in energy) = a constant.

That means that if the uncertainty in energy decreases then the uncertainty in time has to go up, and that means you can see into the future and the past. After realising this he had made contact with the crypto millionaire Bo Zanden who was willing to fund it, and at his university he had built a cryostat, a tough glass sphere in which there was a near vacuum cooled very close to absolute zero. You see, the only way to make sure that the uncertainty in energy is tiny, and to dilate time, is to make sure that the energy is tiny as well, i.e. freeze it down to close to absolute temperature, and that he did.

It was three years later, with Bo pestering him about the imminent deadline, that he finally switched it on. It was a little earlier than he would have liked so health and safety had not been confirmed, and he looked into the void he had created, a few pico-Kelvins from absolute zero. Before he had even pressed the switch to release a ball from a grip at the top of the cavity, the ball appeared to be falling, but only a transparent version of itself, spread out as a stream, like a ghostly column. When he actually pressed the switch the ball fell in full intensity and for a while after it had hit the bottom of the glass sphere, the ghostly stream of balls lingered. Inside the void he had just seen the past, present and future all mashed up together. He quickly looked around to check that no-one was watching, and then did the dance he usually did when he had a major breakthrough.

He looked again at the void, and moved a little closer this time. There was his face in there, but all mashed up! It was only a very indistinct image, ghostly, but unmistakably him.

"It must be a reflection," he said, unconvinced.

It only then became clear to him that something was pulling him towards the void, an inexorable force, remarkably strong. He had moved too close. He grabbed the desk, but the void was pulling him in, and he could not resist any more than we can resist the downwards force of gravity. He had helpfully placed the off switch too far away. As he realised he was going to die, he coolly worked out what was happening. A dilation of time was also a feature of relativity, of gravity. He had effectively created a gravitational source. But, why was the image of himself not of full intensity? That meant it was not inevitable that it would occur. There was a way out! But how? Then the image of himself faded, and few seconds later just as the glass shell was about to break around the vacuum a fuse blew and saved his life.

Shaken and back at his desk, he collapsed with a sign of relief and sent a quick email to Bo Zanden. "It works, in more ways than one, but it came down to the wire!" Being on the cutting edge is certainly exciting, if you can survive it.

If you enjoyed this please keep me afloat to do more physics and writing by contributing the cost of a coffee using paypal (michael.e.mcculloch@gmail.com) https://www.paypal.com/uk/home Thanks. I'm having trouble with other options at the moment.

The Journal of Empiricism

When I used to work at the UK Meteorological Office, I was often in their library when work permitted. That was in the old building in Bracknell, a building which no longer exists. One of my favourite reads was The Meteorological Magazine, which was devoted solely to reporting interesting observations, like the early journals of the Royal Society in the time of Newton and Hooke. I loved reading that because the anomalies gave me something to think about: a large water spout was seen near Bali, St Elmo's fire in the Sargasso Sea, a freshwater layer on the ocean, made it hard for boats to make way... Here were genuine phenomena, mysteries that no-one had ever solved, and maybe I could solve them?!

By the time I found it and had read a few articles I distinctly remember asking at the desk for the more recent issues and I can still remember my disappointment when Yunus the friendly librarian told me apologetically it had been discontinued in 1994.

By that time anomalies were becoming undervalued, and this was part of a decline that has occurred throughout science. Technically we have better observations than ever, but what good are they if the latest compulsory solution is enforced on the subject from above for reasons of social control (climate), profit (medicine) or the furthering of existing research programs? (strings, dark matter).

So, in 1994 The Meteorological Magazine was closed down, and it was replaced by the business-like Meteorological Applications. The same thing has happened in wider physics, but to reinvigorate the field at a deep level what we should do is to make a new journal like those of the early Royal Society. Allow those good at observing to publish freely without forcing them to fudge a solution, and allow those who love to ponder deeply to freely publish their suggested solutions. First look, then think. The old symbiosis would return and we'd advance far faster.

JoE: the Journal of Empiricism?

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