Though fun to see. More interesting than the station keeping (indefinite part) is that it enables ~100km orbits, which are ~5x closer than what remote sensing satellites use today and thus could get 5x the resolution for the same instrument.
Yes, the article also points out that the idea is not new, but rather that this research was focused on addressing practical problems, such as corrosion of the engine's parts.
An Alcubierre drive is not a new idea either, but if someone demonstrated one I would be mightily impressed.
That is an extreme example for multiple reasons, of course, but the point is that the gulf between idea and working thing is often monstrous. Ideas are cheap, implementation is hard.
Very much not a new idea: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Very_low_Earth_orbit
Though fun to see. More interesting than the station keeping (indefinite part) is that it enables ~100km orbits, which are ~5x closer than what remote sensing satellites use today and thus could get 5x the resolution for the same instrument.
100km is the height where meteoroids ablate. You must mean 100k miles and even there the largest meteors start to become visible.
> ~5x closer than what remote sensing satellites use today and thus could get 5x the resolution for the same instrument.
I would think a bit less. You won’t get a factor of 5 decrease in atmosphere to watch through and I would guess you’d get more vibration.
Yes, the article also points out that the idea is not new, but rather that this research was focused on addressing practical problems, such as corrosion of the engine's parts.
An Alcubierre drive is not a new idea either, but if someone demonstrated one I would be mightily impressed.
That is an extreme example for multiple reasons, of course, but the point is that the gulf between idea and working thing is often monstrous. Ideas are cheap, implementation is hard.
Ideas require a ton of research to transform into reality.
'contactless, neutralizer-less radio-frequency (RF) helicon plasma thruster'
fairly sure that wins just on the absolute impossibility of creating an acronym , just all business
works in wind tunnel testing.
It may never work then:)