Because its melting and boiling points are very close together at atmospheric pressures, ... The current efficiency champion is the ion thruster, which has now been used on a number of spacecraft.

Mounted on a satellite, the two-way facing beam is produced by a bespoke ion thruster that uses its discharge to decelerate debris so it can burn up in the Earth's atmosphere. SUBSCRIBE LOG IN ...

Chemical burn rockets can produce a lot of thrust, but only for a short period; this makes them ideal for lofting space vehicles out of Earth’s atmosphere and into outer space, but once they’ve ...

The Beihangkonshi-1 smallsat made the maneuver earlier this month using a self-contained NPT30-I2 electric propulsion system developed by French startup Thrustme. SUBSCRIBE LOG IN ...

The European Space Agency (ESA) has successfully tested a prototype ion engine powered by air that could provide propulsion for orbiting satellites almost indefinitely, and could even help power ...

NASA's ion thrusters work through what is known as the Hall effect. Rather than use a chemical process to create propulsion, Hall-effecct ion thrusters use an electric field from solar panels to ...

GOCE's sophisticated electric ion propulsion system has been switched on, and confirmed to be operating normally, marking another crucial milestone in the satellite's post-launch commissioning phase.

The thruster runs on particles of air in the atmosphere. Others have tried to impro The European Space Agency created the world’s first thruster which allows satellites to remain in orbit for ...

Ion thrusters will not work in Earth’s atmosphere due to the presence of too many ions, so they can only be used in the vacuum of space.

While commercial ion thrusters are good enough for most LEO satellites, these engines only use “10% or less of a small spacecraft’s initial mass in propellant,” according to NASA.