theoretic modification to railgun base components
Optical fiber is not wire. No current flows in optical fiber, so, no magnetic fields are created or destroyed (indeed, getting data signals through a lab full of nasty pulsed magnets intact was the first thing I ever used fiber optics for - at a whopping 9600 (or was it only 2400?) baud.)

I'll suggest MIT 6.002 (via open courseware, or open university or whatever they call it this week) as a nice solid course you can get online for free.