NASA’s Ames Research Center has recently spent $2 million on a powerful microwave source to be used primarily for propulsion research. Kevin Parkin’s team is collaborating with Escape Dynamics in ...

Developing a functional relativistic electron beam propulsion system would require groundbreaking advances in space infrastructure. The beam transmitter would need to operate from a solar-powered ...

Researchers calculated the efficiencies of four important features of microwave-beam-powered propulsion systems for rockets. These findings are critical to minimizing or possibly reducing the cost ...

A Colorado Springs-based venture capital fund is backing CisLunar Industries, a company specializing in the hardware needed ...

Gerald Nordley provided a mass beam propulsion overview at Space Access 2019. There have been many kinds of mass beam propulsion. Use of mass beams, instead of light, allows great efficiency by ...

See the potential of a proton beam propulsion system for interstellar missions as we look beyond current technologies and aim for Proxima Centauri.

Researchers led by the University of Tsukuba found that power could be sent to a free-flying drone via a beam of microwave radiation. The team estimated the efficiency of this process and compared ...

Nuclear electric propulsion would involve a lightweight fission reactor and an efficient thermoelectric generator to convert to electrical power, while the nuclear thermal rocket concept involves ...

The ability to beam power over long distances has wide-ranging implications, from enabling faster travel within the solar system to transmitting power from the sun to other locations like the Moon.

Electric propulsion works by ionizing a neutral gas, usually xenon, and then using electric fields to accelerate the resulting ions. The ions, now forming a high-speed plasma beam, push the ...