Government Scientists Neither Confirm Nor Deny 'Star Wars' Starkiller Research

You know a suspicious amount of energy and power in the room

To lead a galactic empire requires a lot of energy. In fact, this is true for any faction in Star Wars: Legions of electronic droids need some sort of power supply, and the Rebel Alliance must also be concerned about maintaining secret bases and fighters. We do not know exactly how the Star Wars people did in this universe. We have the next best thing: a roundtable with scientists from the Department of Energy speculating on how well energy works in a universe long ago and far away.

Last summer, a one-hour Google Hangout was conducted with Cathy Plesko, an applied physicist at Los Alamos National Laboratory. Peter Thelin, a master optician from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory; Chris Ebbers, a physicist with Lawrence Livermore; and Vishal Patel, a researcher from the Idaho National Laboratory's Nuclear Research Center (Vishal's particular area of ​​research is new forms of nuclear energy that could fuel the spacecraft of tomorrow).

The discussion ranges from the forces of R2-D2 (possibly an atomic source) to the reasons why the Death Star needs an outlet (something that invariably generates great heat), and that's only in the first ten minutes. The panel discusses many points, but they agree that green or blue lightsabers consume more power than red ones. You can watch the one-hour discussion below. It is as enlightening in terms of energy as it is nerdig:

Reforbes, in touch with tomorrow

Now we enter the area of ​​mild SPOILER ALARMS, so anyone interested in staying as ignorant as possible about the upcoming Star Wars: The Force Awakens might do well to stop here.

Now we enter the area of ​​the mild SPOILER ALERT

The official Twitter account of Los Alamos National Labs has today published an article in Wired on a new fictional weapon: the Starkiller, which will be released in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Director JJ Abrams described the weapon Entertainment Weekly as follows:

"It's a lot - and it's recognized as such in the movie - apparently another Death Star," says Abrams. "But what it does, how it works and what the threat is is far greater than what the Death Star could have done, and the Starkiller Base is technologically a further advance in performance."

Los Alamos is no stranger to super weapons. The laboratories were set up in World War II as the headquarters of the Manhattan Project, which designed and manufactured the first nuclear weapons the world has ever seen. Why does Los Alamos talk about possible functions of a star destroying space station? On Twitter, I asked if Los Alamos' labs could confirm to @PopSci that they actually do not work on weapons that can destroy stars.