Beaming power from space to Earth has been a gleam in the eyes of clean-energy advocates for decades, but could spacecraft-to-spacecraft power beaming be used to position satellites in orbit more quickly, particularly cubesats too small for conventional propulsion systems? NASA is studying how an infrastructure of power-generation satellites in orbit, beaming energy to orbital transfer vehicles, could overcome the big disadvantage of electric propulsion-the long time it takes to raise a satellite's orbit after launch because of the low output of electric thrusters. NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center has completed a preliminary concept viability study for space-to-space power beaming to enable rapid geocentric orbit transfer. The high-level study indicated the concept could revolutionize the placement and transfer of space assets, John Dankanich, a mission analyst at Marshall, told the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) Propulsion & Energy Conference in Orlando, Florida, in July.
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机译：几十年来，清洁能源的倡导者一直把从太空向地球发射功率的能力视而不见，但是能否将飞船到太空的功率发射技术用于更快地将卫星定位在轨道上，特别是对于传统推进系统而言太小的立方体卫星？美国宇航局正在研究轨道上的发电卫星的基础设施，如何将能量传递到轨道转移车辆上，从而克服电推进的巨大弊端-由于电动推进器的输出功率低，发射后要花很长时间才能提升卫星的轨道。美国国家航空航天局（NASA）的马歇尔太空飞行中心（Marshall Space Flight Center）已经完成了一项初步的概念可行性研究，以进行空对空功率发射，以实现快速地心轨道转移。马歇尔（Marshall）的任务分析师约翰·丹卡尼奇（John Dankanich）在7月于佛罗里达州奥兰多举行的美国航空航天学会（AIAA）推进与能源会议上表示，这项高水平的研究表明，这一概念可能会改变太空资产的放置和转移。
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