January 2023
Private space stations and NASA’s effort to re-invent itself
... of private commercial space stations. There were many science fiction writers and movie producers who envisioned this type of...com/axiom-station). This may seem to some like science fiction but Axiom Space has contracts underway with Thales Alenia...
March 2015
Dawn of ion propulsion
... tested ion propulsion and other high-risk technologies, helped bring ion propulsion from the domain of science fiction to science fact. Dawn is one of DS1’s beneficiaries, and being the first spacecraft ever built to orbit two target...
August 2016
The promise of space tourism
... life on Earth as doctors, engineers and inventors. Today’s students don’t view living and working in space or on Mars as science fiction, they see it as the future. SpaceShipOne nestled safely beneath her mothership, the White Knight and (below...
November 2018
Being human in space
...programme.” Space generation Many people only know space from the science fiction dramas and computer games that play out on the big ... and family, many people only know space from the science fiction dramas and computer games that play out on the big...
April 2025
Space Elevators - a role in planetary defence?
...km (Figure 2). Figure 2: Relative Speeds Space Elevators. The science fiction author Arthur C Clarke imagined the space elevator as a bridge... 170,000 tonnes/year to GEO and beyond. Science fiction author Arthur C Clarke imagined the space elevator as...
March 2026
Humanity – the potential of space
...), one of two asteroid mining companies launched that year. At the time, asteroid mining was widely dismissed as science fiction. But working with an incredible team of cofounders, we helped make it ‘legit’. The same seriousness was being applied...
