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This Ion Thruster Is The Futuristic Engine That Will Take Us To Mercury

They can reach speeds 15x faster than conventional rockets.
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By 

Technology editor, HuffPost UK

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NASA/JPL

This is an ion thruster, and along with three others it will propel one of the largest missions ever undertaken to Mercury.

Its pale blue exhaust is unlike anything you will have seen and that's because this revolutionary new space engine isn't powered by conventional chemical propellant.

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Lucy Nicholson / Reuters

What makes ion thrusters special is that for the same amount of conventional rocket fuel, one of these can help a spacecraft reach a speed 15 times faster than a conventional chemical thruster.

The only downside is that they're very weak, which means that acceleration can take a very long time.

While acceleration is key on Earth in space the most important task is to reach the highest speed and that's what these thrusters can do.

Just 22cm in diameter, four of these British-developed ion thrusters will propel the European Space Agency's BepiColombo spacecraft all the way to Mercury.

It's a landmark mission - the spacecraft will have a massive payload of 4100kg and contain vital equipment which will give us a glimpse into Mercury's composition.

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AP

 “BepiColombo would not be possible in its current form without these T6 thrusters,” explains ESA propulsion engineer Neil Wallace.

Ion thrusters are still considered a new technology for space travel and while they're used in many small satellites the next step is scaling them up so that they can become viable for human space travel.

BepiColombo will launch in 2018 and should finally arrive at Mercury in 2024.

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Four views of Earth rising above the lunar horizon, photographed by the crew of the Apollo 10 Lunar Module, while in lunar orbit, May 1969.
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