Have you ever sat in bad rush hour traffic (isn’t that redundant?) and said to yourself, “I could get out of this if I had a wormhole”? Me neither, but apparently some astrophysicists have and they’ve developed and published a set of step-by-step do-it-yourself instructions for building one – along with the prerequisite admonishments that these are for informational purposes only and you shouldn’t try this at home. HA! Let’s get started with our wormhole.

“We construct traversable wormholes by starting with simple four-dimensional classical solutions respecting the null energy condition and containing a pair of oppositely charged black holes connected by a non-traversable wormhole. We then consider the perturbative back-reaction of bulk quantum fields in Hartle-Hawking states. Our geometries have zero cosmological constant and are asymptotically flat except for a cosmic string stretching to infinity that is used to hold the black holes apart. Another cosmic string wraps the non-contractible cycle through the wormhole, and its quantum fluctuations provide the negative energy needed for traversability.”

OK, so all we need are a couple of oppositely charged black holes and two cosmic strings. For where to order those online, you might want to check with Zicao Fu, Brianna Grado-White, and Donald Marolf, authors of “Traversable Asymptotically Flat Wormholes with Short Transit Times,” a preprint paper published recently in arXiv.org. Fu is a PhD candidate, Grado-White a graduate student and Marolf a professor in the Department of Physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Their paper does indeed give step-by-step instructions, including the supporting documents and mathematical formulas, for building a wormhole that doesn’t have the instability problem most wormholes have.

“But this wormhole-via-charged-black-holes has two issues. One, it’s still unstable, and if something or someone actually tries to use it, it falls apart. The other is that the two oppositely charged black holes will be attracted to each other — both through gravitational and electric forces — and if they fall together you just get a single, big, neutrally charged and altogether useless black hole.”

Fortunately for those of us who are not astrophysicists, astrophysicist, Paul Sutter at The (trademark pending) Ohio State University has a simple explanation in Live Science. His good news is that charged black holes are real. His bad news is that using a pair with opposite charges means they want to come together right now over me. (John Lennon would have LOVED the idea of wormholes.) The good news is, a cosmic string – extremely thin 1-dimensional topological defects which may have formed during the early days of the universe – could be used to keep them separated … not perfectly, but better than the referee between contestants in a professional wrestling match. The paper suggests getting two cosmic strings and forming a closed loop between the black holes. The loop would then vibrate and churn the space around them until the energy goes negative, creating a negative mass that would stabilize the wormhole, allowing matter (cars?) or even just messages (Anybody home? Marco!) to pass through.

The bad news is (you knew there was more), cosmic strings are hypothetical. However, Sutter gives one more tantalizing bit of good news:

“Still, there’s no reason they can’t exist, so they’re fair game.”

Fair game? Game on! Stop wasting your time honking your horn in that traffic jam and start figuring out a way to get some black holes and a couple of cosmic strings.

Throughout history there have been those great figures whose names everyone seems to know, regardless of whether they actually know anything about them. These are the big hitters of history, seemingly larger than life, almost transcending the bounds of physical entities to become legends. Yet for as well known as they are and for as much as historians might know about their deaths, some of these legendary figures have managed to pose great mysteries in their passing, leading mighty lives only to vanish without a trace after death, only their memories remaining.

Going back into the mists of time we have the great Egyptian ruler Cleopatra, the last active ruler of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt, and her Roman General lover Mark Anthony. When Antony and Cleopatra were defeated in a massive naval battle against Octavian’s forces the during at the 31 BC Battle of Actium, Octavian moved to invade Egypt in 30 BC. Antony’s forces were crushed, and in defeat he committed suicide, likely by stabbing himself, although no one is quite certain. When Cleopatra learned of this death and was faced with being brought in before to a Roman triumphal in celebration of the loathed Octavian’s victory, she too killed herself in a fit of depression and defiance.

Mysteries have long swirled ever since around Cleopatra’s death, and despite the fact that she is one of the most recognizable, iconic, and well-known rulers in history, even all the way up into modern times, there is much we still don’t know about her last days and moments. One persistent mystery is how she died in the first place. The most common theory is that she killed herself by enticing an asp or other venomous snake to bite her arm, but there are all sorts of other ideas, including that she used a poison loaded hairpin she is said to have carried at all times, that she applied some sort of poisonous ointment to her skin, or that she simply overdosed on opium. No one really knows. We also don’t know where her final resting place is, as it was never recorded, although it was written that she was buried together with Mark Antony.

It has been theorized that Cleopatra would have had a tomb prepared for herself in some form, probably near Alexandria, but where it could be is anyone’s guess. There have been many digs trying to find the lost tomb of Cleopatra, and in 2009 archeologists investigated a promising site at the Taposiris Magna temple in Abusir, Egypt. Here there were found mummies, busts featuring her visage, a mask believed to have belonged to Mark Anthony, and coins with their likenesses, all of which seemed to suggest that Cleopatra and Antony were not far away, but the dig was ultimately unsuccessful. In more recent years it has been suggested that her tomb in fact might now lie under the sea, and in the end the lost tomb of Cleopatra is one of the holy grails of archeology.

Just as famous as Cleopatra was the iconic Alexander III of Macedon, more popularly known as Alexander the Great, who ruled from 356 BC to 323 BC and is well-known for his reign of stunning conquests spanning an empire from Greece to India and covering large swaths of Asia and northeast Africa. His inexorable, unstoppable path of victory came to an end in 323 BC, when he was killed in Babylon. His body was then supposedly placed within an opulent sarcophagus fashioned of solid gold and filled with honey, all of which was then placed within a golden casket and put on display in a tomb in Alexandria, where the sarcophagus was visited by such notable historical figures as Julius Caesar, Augustus, Cleopatra, Octavian, Caligula, Hadrian, Severus, Caracalla, and many others. The tomb was finally sealed after it was plundered for gold and Alexander’s breast plate was stolen, and it remained that way until Christianity came to the region in the 4th century and paganism was outlawed. After this, Alexander the Great’s tomb and casket just sort of vanished off the face of the earth. To this day no one has any idea where Alexander the Great’s tomb and sarcophagus are, with it being theorized to rest at a variety of places including Alexandria, Greece, or even all the way over in Venice, but despite countless expeditions it remains one of the great historical mysteries.

Speaking of empire building warlords, here we have the founder and first emperor of the Mongol Empire, Genghis Khan. During his reign and ruthless expansion across vast areas he would conquer regions sprawled out from the Caspian Sea to the Pacific and encompassing large portions of Eurasia and most of Central Asia and China. It would become one of the largest empires the world has ever known, all fashioned through a brutal and bloody campaign, and all darkly shadowed by a cloud of violent genocide and punctuated by the merciless massacres of countless innocent people. Genghis Khan is one of the most notorious, vicious, and feared tyrants in history, and upon his death on August 18, 1227 during a military campaign in China it is probably safe to say that there was no love lost among the cowering populace of the lands he had held in an iron, ravenous grip. However, for as much as we know about his specacular life, his death and final resting place remain complete mysteries.

Genghis Khan

One mystery is his exact cause of death, which has been variously theorized to have been dying in action, falling from a horse, or succumbing to some illness or infection of a wound, or even being murdered by his own men, but no one really knows. What we do know is that Genghis Khan had stipulated to his men that upon his death he was to be buried in an unmarked grave and its location kept a total secret. To this end, his closest men really went overboard. It is said that the location where he was buried was intentionally trampled over by nearly a thousand horsemen in order to mask its location, after which every single one of the horsemen was killed. Even as the body was being moved to its final resting place it is believed that his personal funeral escort had everyone who witnessed their movements executed, as well as the ones who dug the grave, to keep it all secret, with the final result being that no one has a clue as to where one of the most fearsome warlords in history is buried.

Of course with such a veil of secrecy there are other legends surrounding the grave of Genghis Khan as well, such as the legend that a whole river was diverted over the burial site to hide it. Although there is a mausoleum with some of Genghis Khan’s possessions located in the town of Ejin Horo Banner, Inner Mongolia, this is not his actual resting place, and archeologists have scoured the world trying to locate it, utilizing ground penetrating radar, satellite imagery, and all manner of cutting edge technology, but it has evaded all attempts to find it and remains lost to history.

Quite similar is the lost grave of another great ruler, Attila the Hun, who ruled the Huns from 434 to 453, and was the head of a great empire of tribes that stretched across large swaths of Central Asia, the Caucasus, and Central and Eastern Europe. He was known as a fearsome conqueror and plunderer who sought to spread out across Europe and Persia seeking to invade and dominate new lands, constantly battling the Romans and establishing himself as one of the Roman Empire’s greatest foes. In 453 Attila the Hun would according to records die a rather unusual death when he purportedly choked on a nosebleed at his own wedding feast, an odd end to such a ferocious and feared conqueror. Upon his death, it is said that Attila the Hun was buried within a coffin lavishly covered with gold and silver and filled with gems and other treasure, and that just as with Genghis Khan a river was diverted to hide the grave, and everyone who dug it was mercilessly killed to preserve its secret. Attila the Hun’s grave has never been found, and both he and even the Hunnic people themselves largely remain mysteries.

Attila the Hun

In later eras we have other tyrants and rulers who are known for their mysterious graves. Between 1448 to 1476, the area of modern day Romania known as Wallachia was ruled by Vlad III Dracula, also known as Vlad the Impaler, and perhaps even more known as the inspiration behind Bram Stoker’s Dracula, as well as for his infamous cruelty and his gruesome habit of impaling enemies on spikes. Vlad the Impaler was killed in battle against Ottoman forces and his body supposedly decapitated and chopped into pieces, but where his final grave is has remained a mystery. It was long thought that he was interred in the Monastery of Snagov outside of Bucharest, with an unmarked tombstone long thought to be his. However, in the 1930s this grave was dug up only to find the bones and jaws of horses. Since then there have been many proposed sites for Vlad the Impaler’s final resting place, but so far it has not been found, and the grave of the real life Dracula remains steeped in mystery.

It is not only rulers and warlords who are well known for their elusive final resting places, and some of the more famous mysterious lost graves belong to well-known artists. Perhaps the most famous of all of these is that of the great artist, inventor, overall polymath and master of the Renaissance, Leonardo Da Vinci. After dying in 1519 at the age of 67, which was quite old for the era, Da Vinci was supposedly interred beneath a church that was destroyed during the French Revolution in 1789. When workers rebuilding the site went through the rubble, they are said to have found some human remains and a part of a demolished headstone that were believed to have belonged to Da Vinci, and that these were brought to another chapel. Although his official resting place is France’s Chateau d’Amboise, it is still unknown if these remains and the piece of headstone kept there are really his at all, and even the description displayed at the grave explains it as merely the “presumed remains” of Da Vinci.

Leonardo Da Vinci

There is also the story of the grave of one of history’s great composers, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, who died in 1791 at the age of 35 from an unidentified illness. Considering how incredibly famous Mozart has become over the centuries, one would think that his grave would be known as well, but this does not seem to be the case. One of the problems is that in life he was not nearly as well-known as he would go on to be, after his death, and so his burial was not all that big of an event. In fact, it seems what has gone on to be considered one of the greatest composers of all time was rather unceremoniously put in a cheap wooden coffin and buried in a cemetery in a common, unmarked grave, possibly even buried in a sort of mass grave with others. Making things even more difficult is that in that era it was common to remove all of the graves to make way for new ones every 10 years, so Mozart’s remains could have gone anywhere, possibly even crushed or cremated and otherwise destroyed. In 1801, a gravedigger came forward to claim that he had in his possession the skull of Mozart, but DNA tests in later years have cast doubt on this. Where are Mozart’s remains? Ideas range from that they have vanished forever to that fans of the composer had them moved to a safe location, but in the end no one really knows.

Here we have looked at only a few of the lost graves and tombs of some of history’s most important people. Where did they go? How could such prominent, larger than life figures in life figures just disa ppear in death? Some of these lost graves have gone on to become some of the most highly sought after treasures in archeology, yet they remain hidden and evasive, keeping their secrets close. One day we may find the answers we seek, but for now these spectacular historical figures remain enigmas in death, seemingly eveporating into the mists of time.

In an online chat with Apollo 11 astronaut Michael Collins, one Twitter user asked him, “Do you believe in life outside Earth?” and he simply replied, “Yes”. So, does that mean that he believes that microorganisms may live deep within layers of ice on far away planets, or does he believe that actual aliens really do exist? It’s a pretty vague answer that raises even more questions on what he believes in and what the astronauts may have witnessed while they were on the moon.

Back in 1969 when Collins, Neil Armstrong, and Buzz Aldrin conducted the first ever manned moon landing, there was a very odd exchange between the Apollo 11 crew and Mission Control. On the third day, Armstrong witnessed an unexplained object moving parallel to them, but it was brushed off as just the third stage of the Saturn-V rocket that had brought them into space. When Armstrong asked Mission Control, “Do you have any idea where the S-IVB is with respect to us?” they responded with, “The S-IVB is about 6,000 nautical miles from you now. Over.” Many people believe that what the crew witnessed was actually a UFO.

Michael Collins

And while Collins’ response on whether he believes life exists outside of Earth was a simple one-worded answer, he isn’t the first Apollo 11 astronaut to give his opinion on other worldly topics.

Buzz Aldrin and three other astronauts (Al Worden, Edgar Mitchell and Gordon Cooper) took part in a study where they all passed lie detector tests when asked about their experiences with UFOs. Aldrin has stated many times that he witnessed a UFO following them while he, Collins, and Armstrong were on their way to the moon. He stated, “There was something out there that was close enough to be observed, sort of L-shaped.”

Buzz Aldrin

And while Neil Armstrong never publicly discussed any interest in aliens, a letter that had been discovered suggests that he was in fact fascinated by UFOs and that he even invited a UFO expert to join him for dinner – where they more than likely discussed the topic of extraterrestrials.

Neil Armstrong

Another interesting fact about Armstrong is that he may have possibly been contacted by the “Men in Black”. In one portion of the 18-page FBI file on Armstrong, it stated that two “well-dressed” men walked into an Ohio Town Hall and asked several very personal questions about the astronaut, such as his address, how many children he had, and which restaurants he ate at. Seems a little suspicious if you ask me…

If you see the words “US military,” “secret urban tunnels,” “underground experimentation” and “urgent need” in the same sentence, it can’t be good news. If you see them in a tweet that links to an actual government website soliciting actual requests for proposals to satisfy those needs, it may be time to worry. If they emphasize that they need them “right away,” is it time to book the next flight to New Zealand? Or Mars?

@DARPA

Attention, city dwellers! We’re interested in identifying university-owned or commercially managed underground urban tunnels & facilities able to host research & experimentation. https://go.usa.gov/xVWCn

It’s short notice… We’re asking for responses by Aug. 30 at 5:00 PM ET.

That’s the ‘take us to your tunnels’ tweet posted on August 28, 2019 – just two days before they’re urgently needed – by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the agency of the US Department of Defense responsible for the development of emerging technologies for use by the military. The link takes you to FedBizOps.gov, the Federal Business Opportunities website where private contractors can learn about open government projects. While it seems hard to believe that DARPA would be so public with its urgent needs, perhaps that’s part of the plan – make part of the project public so no one gets suspicious. Too late for that!

@DARPA

The ideal space would be a human-made underground environment spanning several city blocks w/ complex layout & multiple stories, including atriums, tunnels & stairwells. Spaces that are currently closed off from pedestrians or can be temporarily used for testing are of interest.

Testing? Testing what? The comments on the tweets give plenty of ideas from the ridiculous to the downright scary. They also point out that there are PLENTY of vast unused or unfinished tunnels and spaces around the country that were once planned for subways, cars, pedestrians, shopping malls and other innocent but underfunded purposes that had to be closed down before they could be completed and opened.

The subterranean domain – whether human-made tunnels, urban underground infrastructure, or natural cave networks – is becoming increasingly relevant for global security and disaster-related search and rescue missions As such, DARPA is interested in understanding the state-of-the-art in innovative technologies that have the potential to disruptively and positively impact how the underground domain is leveraged without prohibitive cost and risk to human lives.

DARPA is interested in understanding the state-of-the-art in innovative technologies that may enable future solutions to rapidly map, navigate, and search unknown complex subterranean environments to locate objects of interest. To support these technologies, DARPA is looking to find locations that researchers can utilize to experiment and enhance their innovative approaches.

The short explanatory document doesn’t really explain much. While it claims the project has a noble cause – training for “global security and disaster-related search and rescue missions” – it also wants to learn how to “rapidly map, navigate, and search unknown complex subterranean environments to locate objects of interest.” Whose tunnels are they planning to find and what “objects” are they interested in? Have they found the secret underground location of the Ark of the Covenant? The hiding place of the long-rumored-not-to-be-dead Elvis? A time machine? Putin’s mini-nukes? Anybody’s mini-nukes?

Is this test a failure or a success?

All of this sounds sinister, yet it also sounds like a moneymaker for a cash-strapped city stuck with an unfinished public works tunnel and looking for ways to pay for filling potholes. (Are you listening, Cincinnati?) Is the money worth the risk of DARPA collapsing the city into a massive sinkhole for “testing” purposes?

Sorry, DARPA. Only people are innocent until proven guilty, and that’s getting a little shaky these days. Secret government agencies that develop futuristic technologies are always under suspicion.

So, what’s up with the urgent need for tunnels?