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Laser-powered Plane 

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PCQ Bureau
New Update

Drive cellular-tower manufacturers and your neighborhood cablewallah out of business? And that too with mobile transponders on an airplane that flies for months on end, despite having no fuel onboard? Wishful thinking? Perhaps, but that is what a NASA research team thinks they can do!

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And for this, they came up with the idea of a perpetually flying (or rather almost perpetual) remotely-powered airplane that can fly over a city's skyline.

And to prove to skeptics that the idea is not so eccentric after all, the NASA team recently demonstrated a small proof-of-concept test of its proposed perpetually-flying airplane-an aircraft with special photovoltaic cells spread on its fuselage. Once launched from a special launch pad, the aircraft is powered remotely from the ground by focusing a laser beam on the photovoltaic cells on its fuselage. These cells then convert the laser beam into electric power for the small motor at the nose. With a wingspan of 1.5 m and weighing only about 300 grams, the tiny plane kept flying as long as the laser beam was not interrupted.

Courtesy: NASA

Photovoltaic cells are

spread on the fuselage

Beaming power to the plane from a ground-based laser

Courtesy: NASAThe test was done inside a huge hanger at NASA's Marshal Space Flight Center in Alabama. The NASA team now plans to build and test a bigger plane under the open skies and in real conditions, including on cloudy days. And if that too becomes a success, the time may not be far when you will no longer see cell-phone towers sticking out like sore thumbs on the city skyline. Neither will you have your monthly fight with the cablewallah over the forever-rising cable bills thanks to DTH broadcasts. Wonder what they will think of next?

Benoy George Thomas

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