“Impossible” EmDrive to be Tested in Space

A close relation to NASA’s EmDrive propulsion system – a fuelless electromagnetic thruster, the existence of which breaks Newton’s Third Law of Motion – is set to be tested in space. Developed by chemical engineer Guido Fetta, the Cannae Drive – which, for all intents and purposes, is indistinguishable from the EmDrive (pictured below) – will be launched into a low Earth orbit of 150 miles within a cube-shaped satellite, dubbed Cubesat (pictured above). The satellite’s drive will then be tested in orbit over the course of six months.

“Cannae’s thruster technology is capable of generating thrust from a few uN up through several newton thrust levels and higher levels,” the Cannae website reads. “The Cannae thruster technology is particularly useful for small satellite missions due to its low power, mass and volume requirements. Our thruster configuration for the cubesat mission with [new sister company] Theseus Space Inc is anticipated to require less than 1.5 U volume and will use less than 10 watts of power to perform station keeping thrusting.”

“Once demonstrated in orbit,” the site adds, “Theseus will offer our thruster platforms to the satellite marketplace.”

In related news, a paper on the EmDrive which proves the technology’s legitimacy, written by the NASA Eagleworks lab, has passed peer review and will be published by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) and will published in its Journal of Propulsion and Power in December 2016, according to IBTimes.