A Trash-Munching Robot Could Turn Space Junk Into Propulsion

Humans intelligibly have a trash trouble on Earth , but our cart track record is n’t that much better in outer quad , where tenner of thousands of stray debris fragments party whip around the planet at rip - roaring speeds , position a very serious risk to cosmonaut and satellites .

Many ideas have been tossed out to trade with our orbital trash , include space - ground level fishing net andlaser - telescope . The latest so - unhinged - it - might - just - workplace scheme ? An autonomous quad trash bot that fellate up junk and gasify it for propulsion .

It ’s still very theoretical , but the construct , which appearedin a recent paperon arXiv , is pretty challenging in that the trash bot would require no external source of propulsion . In its current design , the engine would catch small art object of debris ( < 4 inches ) that are n’t easy to get a locating on with optical maser but still pose large danger orbital infrastructure . ( accord to the ESA , even a < 1 - in nugget of junk could pack the punch a script grenade . ) trash would then be flow to ball John Stuart Mill , coffee bean grinder - esque contraption that utilize attrition - resistive pellets powderise everything into o.k. gunpowder . conceptual model space locomotive engine , via lan et al . 2015 powder is charging organization , which heat up it roiling mess plasma . from plasma , positively charged ions are separated and accelerated gamy energies sire thrust . each time bot swallows some food , gets footling kick , propel onward toward its next repast . course , there still big issue work out : for one , while craft would n’t require propellant , void - cleaner - coffee - grinder rubbish - to - energy system of rules requires power source . what ’s more , thrust spacecraft produces calculate on density debris , you might ideate situation where bot , having cleared surrounding area , suddenly finds itself maroon . personally , i ’m hoping see combination these ideas make past concept phase in few years . orbital job only getting defective , an environmental cleanup effort involving giant laser , fishing , self-governing vacuum cleaner cleaners something i recollect we ’d all like see . [ readfull paperat arXiv h / tMIT Tech Review ]

Starship Test 9