 |  New Concept May Enhance Earth-Mars Communication
 17 October 2009
ESA's SMART-1 got to the Moon in 2004 after 16 months using ion propulsion; its thruster only generated 0.2 millimeters per second per second of acceleration, but that’s sufficient! The trick is to find possible orbital trajectories in our Solar System where such a tiny amount of thrust, applied perpendicular to the direction of the satellite’s motion, can usefully keep it in a certain location, supporting scientific observations or communications.
News content on this website, where abstracts are taken from full articles elsewhere, are assumed public domain. All uncredited images are assumed as public domain with the exception of logos which are generally trademarks of the organisation whose materials are cited.
| |
