mileage on the engine increases. That wisdom does not hold true for NASA’s ion engine, whose odometer continues to spin to the delight of its owners. This little engine that could has more than made ...

CLEVELAND — A small robotic surveyor arrives to explore a near-Earth asteroid. Another robotic spacecraft is returning to Earth with a pristine comet surface sample. Meanwhile, a robotic explorer is ...

Sending an object to another star is still the stuff of science fiction. But some concrete missions could get us at least part way there. These "interstellar precursor missions" include a trip to the ...

Space debris is a growing threat to satellites and missions, with over 14,000 pieces already cluttering low-Earth orbit. To address this, Kazunori Takahashi, a researcher at Tohoku University in Japan ...

A new era for space propulsion? An ion engine twenty-five times more powerful than NASA's current best model has just been successfully tested in the laboratory. This technology, which combines ...

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Over the last several months, we’ve been enjoying a front-row seat as [Jay Bowles] of Plasma Channel has been developing and perfecting his design for a high voltage multi-stage ionic thruster. With ...

Staying in orbit can be challenging, at least for lower orbits that are more affected by Earth's atmosphere. But, such orbits also come with advantages, such as better vantage points for new ...