Originally published February 6 2006
Solar-powered plasma thruster tested
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
The Helicon Double Layer Thruster uses solar electricity from the sun to make a magnetic field, which creates a beam of plasma to power ships through space. The plasma thruster uses less fuel and has an almost infinite lifespan.
The Helicon Double Layer Thruster (HDLT) technology to be used by the ESA was developed by Dr Christine Charles and Professor Rod Boswell from the Research School of Physical Sciences and Engineering at ANU.
The technology was recently verified at the Ecole Polytechnique in Paris, one of the great research centres in France, under a contract from Dr Roger Walker of the Advanced Concept Team of ESA.
The French group was lead by Dr Pascal Chabert who has been collaborating with the ANU group for nearly a decade and has spent many months working with Dr Charles and Professor Boswell.
The HDLT uses solar electricity from the sun to create a magnetic field through which hydrogen is passed to make a beam of plasma, powering ships through space.
While the plasma thruster has a fraction of the power of the rockets that launch the space shuttle, it uses far less fuel and gets more thrust as a ratio of the fuel it burns, making it ideal for interplanetary missions.
The physics behind the HDLT technology is based on the northern and southern aurorae, natural phenomena that occur when electrified gas released by the Sun hits the magnetic field of the Earth and creates a boundary of two plasma layers.
Electrically charged particles pick up energy as they travel through the layers of different electrical properties, thereby creating thrust as they leave the spacecraft.
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Dr Charles and Professor Rod Boswell first created spontaneous current-free plasma double layers in their laboratory in 2003 and realised their accelerating properties could enable new electrode-free spacecraft thrusters.
Dr Charles says the ANU thruster has the edge on rival technologies as it is simpler and has been proven to work with many propellants including hydrogen, a waste product of human habitation.
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