Related papers: AB Levitator and Electricity Storage
We present a new methodology which can determine magnetic helicity transport by the passage of helical magnetic field lines from sub-photosphere and the shuffling motions of foot-points of preexisting coronal field lines separately. It is…
Bio-inspired vehicles are currently leading the way in the quest to produce a vehicle capable of flight and underwater navigation. However, a fully functional vehicle has not yet been realized. We present the first fully functional vehicle…
With the increasing demand for air travel and the urgency to reduce emissions, transitioning from fossil fuel-based propulsion systems is a critical step toward sustainable aviation. While batteries are widely used in urban air mobility,…
Rapid aerial grasping through robots can lead to many applications that utilize fast and dynamic picking and placing of objects. Rigid grippers traditionally used in aerial manipulators require high precision and specific object geometries…
The use of electric low-thrust propulsion systems for orbit maneuvers is becoming a popular choice among satellite manufacturers due to their inherent merits over their chemical counterparts. Many designers choose to incorporate multiple of…
Launching orbital and suborbital rockets from a high altitude is beneficial because of e.g. nozzle optimisation and reduced drag. Aeroplanes and gas balloons have been used for the purpose. Here we present a concept where a balloon is…
Exploring and traveling to distant stars has long fascinated humanity but has been limited due to the vast distances. The Breakthrough Starshot Program aims at eliminating this limitation by traveling to Alpha Centauri, which is 4.37…
Unmanned aerial vehicles have been demonstrated successfully in a variety of tasks, including surveying and sampling tasks over large areas. These vehicles can take many forms. Quadrotors' agility and ability to hover makes them well suited…
In this paper, a new unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) structure, referred to as swash mass UAV, is presented. It consists of a double blade coaxial shaft rotor and four swash masses that allow changing the orientation and maneuvering the UAV.…
Energy harvesting is the fundamental activity in almost all forms of space exploration known to humans. So far, in most cases, it is not feasible to bring, along with probe, spacecraft or rover suitable supply of fuel to cover all mission's…
A charged tether or wire experiences Coulomb drag when inserted into flowing plasma. In the solar wind the Coulomb drag can be utilised as efficient propellantless interplanetary propulsion as the electric solar wind sail (electric sail,…
Levitation optomechanics exploits the unique mechanical properties of trapped nano-objects in vacuum in order to address some of the limitations of clamped nanomechanical resonators. In particular, its performance is foreseen to contribute…
Aerocapture leverages atmospheric drag to convert a spacecraft's hyperbolic trajectory into a bound orbit. For some aerocapture missions, heating due to the radiation of high temperature gases in the shock-layer can be much larger than the…
We present a concept for a spacecraft that can controllably alter the trajectory of an Earth threatening asteroid using gravity as a towline. The spacecraft hovers near the asteroid with thrusters angled outward so the exhaust does not…
To date, insect scale robots capable of controlled flight have used flapping wings for generating lift, but this requires a complex and failure-prone mechanism. A simpler alternative is electrohydrodynamic (EHD) thrust, which requires no…
Autonomous delivery of goods using a MAV is a difficult problem, as it poses high demand on the MAV's control, perception and manipulation capabilities. This problem is especially challenging if the exact shape, location and configuration…
In nearly all concepts invoked or proposed to change or shield gravity it is intuitively assumed that manipulation of gravity automatically leads to a breakthrough for propulsion. In this study it is shown, that even if gravity could be…
Two technological problems must be solved before daring to interstellar flight: fuel and propulsion. The highest energy-density fuel is antimatter in its solid or liquid state and this fuel is likely to be our primary choice for multi-ton…
This paper proposes a novel quaternion-based approach for tracking the translation (position and linear velocity) and rotation (attitude and angular velocity) trajectories of underactuated Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs). Quadrotor UAVs are…
The innovative concept of Electric Aircraft is a challenging topic involving different control objectives. For instance, it becomes possible to reduce the size and the weight of the generator by using the battery as an auxiliary generator…