NASA Banking on Solar Electric Propulsions's Slow but Steady Push

摘要

The list of technologies NASA says it needs for a crewed mission to Mars notionally envisioned for the 2030s includes large-scale electric propulsion systems that dwarf those used today aboard many satellites. "The type of solar electric propulsion that is flying now, at the 4 kilowatt or 5 kilowatt level, is very useful for doing things like station keeping," said David Manzella, an engineer with the solar electric propulsion group at NASA's Glenn Research Center near Cleveland. "But it doesn't provide enough thrust to move heavy payloads in short times,'' Neither would the first in a series of scaled-up solar electric systems NASA is working on now, which are being paid for by the agency's Space Technology Mission Directorate.