On Monday, NASA announced that its advanced ion propulsion engine operated for 48,000 hours, or five and a half years – and that’s without stops for fuel or coffee.
Developed under NASA‘s Evolutionary Xenon Thruster (NEXT) project, the engine now holds the record for the longest test duration of any type of space propulsion system.
NEXT is a solar electric propulsion system where electricity from the spacecraft’s solar panels is used to power a a 7-kW class ion thruster. In this, particles of xenon gas are electrically charged and then accelerated to speeds up to 90,000 mph (145,000 km/h). Such thrusters have already been used on spacecraft, such as NASA’s Dawn probe, and engineers are very interested in them because of their much higher performance compared to conventional chemical rocket engines.
The test was carried out in a vacuum chamber at NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio, where the NEXT thruster continually fired day and night. In December, it had already passed 43,000 hours of operation and when it passed 48,00 hours it had consumed 1,918 lb (870 kg) of xenon propellant and generated a total impulse that would take over 22,000 lb (10,000 kg) of conventional rocket propellant for comparable applications.
The Latest Bing News on:
Ion propulsion engine
- Archer Installs ‘Automotive Style’ Air Taxi Battery Pack Production Lineon May 9, 2024 at 12:35 pm
The manufacturing line, which Archer says is capable of producing 15,000 battery packs per year, will support the company’s air taxi production facility.
- New spacecraft system uses air as fuel to offer endless electric propulsionon May 9, 2024 at 4:47 am
This innovative concept, called air-breathing electric propulsion spacecraft, will fly pretty close to our planet in the very low Earth orbit (VLEO).
- Future Orion Capsule Propulsion Embraces Additive Manufacturingon May 8, 2024 at 7:16 am
Orion Main Engine injector test engine is fired at NASA's White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico. Credit: NASA HOUSTON—The European Space Agency (ESA)-provided service modules for NASA’s first six ...
- Starfish Space executes rendezvous between Otter Pup and D-Orbit's IONon May 7, 2024 at 7:27 am
By mid-April, Otter Pup and ION were in position for the final rendezvous attempt. ION passed by Otter Pup at increasingly close orbits, down to within approximately 1 kilometer. On Friday, April 19th ...
- Electric aeroplanes are already in our skies, so when will they become the norm?on May 4, 2024 at 2:38 pm
Multiple Australian companies are pioneering the country's electric aviation industry. So how are green planes powered, how safe are they, and what will it cost?
- NASA's groundbreaking new thruster could unlock interplanetary travelon May 3, 2024 at 1:38 pm
Most of today's commercial spacecraft lack the capacity move from low Earth orbit to other planets like the moon or Mars, requiring a boost from the launch vehicle.
- A Remarkable New Thruster Could Achieve Escape Velocity—and Interplanetary Travelon May 3, 2024 at 4:30 am
However, they’re not perfect. In the future, spacecraft will need to perform high-velocity propulsive maneuvers—such as achieving escape velocity and orbital capture—that current ion engines can’t ...
- New space company seeks to solve orbital mobility with high delta-v spacecrafton April 30, 2024 at 6:31 am
But a new company, Portal Space Systems, emerged from stealth on Tuesday with an alternative: solar-thermal propulsion. The company's founder, Jeff Thornburg, said Portal Space will focus on mobility ...
The Latest Google Headlines on:
Ion propulsion engine
[google_news title=”” keyword=”ion propulsion engine” num_posts=”10″ blurb_length=”0″ show_thumb=”left”]
The Latest Bing News on:
Evolutionary Xenon Thruster
- New spacecraft system uses air as fuel to offer endless electric propulsionon May 9, 2024 at 4:47 am
This innovative concept, called air-breathing electric propulsion spacecraft, will fly pretty close to our planet in the very low Earth orbit (VLEO).
- Space Exploration : New Fusion Drive propulsion system successfully testedon May 3, 2024 at 2:45 am
A new FireStar Fusion Drive has been successfully tested designed specifically for space exploration. Its latest iteration offers a 50% thrust ...
- Evolutionary biology articles from across Nature Portfolioon April 25, 2024 at 5:00 pm
Ancient proteins carry genetic information from fossils that are too old or degraded for ancient DNA recovery. This protocol describes the extraction and tandem mass spectrometry sequencing of ...
- Human Ancestors May Have Bucked an Evolutionary Trendon April 17, 2024 at 1:24 pm
In evolution, competition is thought to be a zero-sum game. One species adapts and survives. Another doesn't and dies off. A new study in Nature Ecology & Evolution posits that human ancestors ...
- Wärtsilä Launches New High-Performance Thruster and Propulsion Control Solutionon April 15, 2024 at 5:00 pm
(Credit: Wärtsilä) Wärtsilä WST-E embedded electric steerable thruster (Credit: Wärtsilä) One of three newly introduced Wärtsilä WST-R retractable thrusters – the WST-14R (Credit ...
- Evolutionary Psychologyon March 23, 2024 at 11:51 am
So, too, did the human brain. Evolutionary psychology is the study of the ways in which the mind was shaped by pressures to survive and reproduce. Findings in this field often shed light on ...
- Upgraded Plasma Thruster Is Smaller, More Powerfulon March 30, 2023 at 8:39 am
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: Not Just For TIE Fighters Anymoreon March 2, 2022 at 11:30 pm
Xenon, krypton, or argon are common choices for these thrusters, though other materials, like magnesium, zinc, and iodine have been experimented with in some designs. The vast majority of ion ...
- Evolutionary Psychiatryon February 1, 2022 at 3:32 pm
Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, Vol. 159, Issue. , p. 105580. Evolutionary psychiatry attempts to explain and examine the development and prevalence of psychiatric disorders through the lens of ...
- Punctuated Equilibriumon January 19, 2022 at 3:33 pm
Now it is widely recognized as a useful model for one kind of evolutionary change. The relative importance of punctuated and gradual patterns of evolution is a subject of debate and research.
The Latest Google Headlines on:
Evolutionary Xenon Thruster
[google_news title=”” keyword=”Evolutionary Xenon Thruster” num_posts=”10″ blurb_length=”0″ show_thumb=”left”]