When [Jay Bowles] demoed his first-generation ion thruster on Plasma Channel, the resulting video picked up millions of views and got hobbyists and professionals alike talking. While ionic lifters … ...

Ion thrusters used in space inject a negative particle beam into the exhaust to neutralize it, so this doesn’t happen. Report comment. Reply. Alysson Rowan says: September 20, 2022 at 1:17 am ...

Ion thrusters need a power source and an effective one if they will last more than a decade under thrust. The paper defined ...

A team of researchers has come up with plasma beam that can push space debris out of orbit. Mounted on a satellite, the two-way facing beam is produced by a bespoke ion thruster that uses its ...

“The biggest challenge is [ion thrusters] need 20,000 or 30,000 volts just to work. High voltage on an aircraft doesn’t come easy,” he says.

The propulsion system for NASA's planned moon-orbiting Gateway space station has been undergoing qualification testing at NASA's Glenn Research Center in Cleveland.

NASA's Evolutionary Xenon Thruster (NEXT) ion engine has set a new world record by clocking up 43,000 hours of continuous operation at NASA’s Glenn Research Center’s Electric Propulsion ...

And, by some measures, it outperformed a xenon-based thruster by 50 percent. Space-based demo Working hardware was flown on a 12-unit cubesat weighing about 20 kilograms called Beihangkongshi-1.

Ion thrusters are the most common primary engine powering satellites through orbital maneuvers today. But to travel from low-Earth orbit (LEO) to farther orbits—or even the Moon—requires a ...

Predicting the lifetime of an electric ion thruster is notoriously difficult. You have to account for the chamber wall ...

NASA ion thruster sets endurance record Sept. 12, 2013 Engineers assemble the NASA Evolutionary Xenon Thruster (NEXT) before it begins its 5.5-year endurance test.