{"id":97256,"date":"2019-10-09T15:03:24","date_gmt":"2019-10-09T22:03:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2019\/10\/flight-of-an-aeroplane-with-solid-state-propulsion"},"modified":"2019-10-09T15:03:24","modified_gmt":"2019-10-09T22:03:24","slug":"flight-of-an-aeroplane-with-solid-state-propulsion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2019\/10\/flight-of-an-aeroplane-with-solid-state-propulsion","title":{"rendered":"Flight of an aeroplane with solid-state propulsion"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

Circa 2018<\/p>\n

\n

Since the first aeroplane flight more than 100 years ago, aeroplanes have been propelled using moving surfaces such as propellers and turbines. Most have been powered by fossil-fuel combustion. Electroaerodynamics, in which electrical forces accelerate ions in a fluid1<\/a>,2<\/a><\/sup>, has been proposed as an alternative method of propelling aeroplanes\u2014without moving parts, nearly silently and without combustion emissions3<\/a>,4<\/a>,5<\/a>,6<\/a><\/sup>. However, no aeroplane with such a solid-state propulsion system has yet flown. Here we demonstrate that a solid-state propulsion system can sustain powered flight, by designing and flying an electroaerodynamically propelled heavier-than-air aeroplane. We flew a fixed-wing aeroplane with a five-metre wingspan ten times and showed that it achieved steady-level flight. All batteries and power systems, including a specifically developed ultralight high-voltage (40-kilovolt) power converter, were carried on-board. We show that conventionally accepted limitations in thrust-to-power ratio and thrust density4<\/a>,6<\/a>,7<\/a><\/sup>, which were previously thought to make electroaerodynamics unfeasible as a method of aeroplane propulsion, are surmountable. We provide a proof of concept for electroaerodynamic aeroplane propulsion, opening up possibilities for aircraft and aerodynamic devices that are quieter, mechanically simpler and do not emit combustion emissions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Circa 2018 Since the first aeroplane flight more than 100 years ago, aeroplanes have been propelled using moving surfaces such as propellers and turbines. Most have been powered by fossil-fuel combustion. Electroaerodynamics, in which electrical forces accelerate ions in a fluid1,2, has been proposed as an alternative method of propelling aeroplanes\u2014without moving parts, nearly silently [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":513,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1497,1491],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-97256","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy","category-transportation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97256","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/513"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97256"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97256\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97256"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97256"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97256"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}