Nature, on a new kind of paper airplane.
excerpt:
Then, in 1997, researchers at the US Air Force Research Laboratory in California used a high-power infrared laser to propel a saucer-sized aluminium craft for a few seconds. Laser pulses converted air in an inlet chamber into a high-pressure plasma. The thrust thus created lifted the lightcraft hundreds of feet into the air.
This project was a NASA collaboration to investigate the possibility of using laser propulsion as a low-cost method for launching small satellites.
Yabe and colleagues have more modest aspirations. Their aeroplanes are just a few centimetres across, and are made from a fraction of a gram of folded aluminium foil. The fuel is a coating of an acrylic polymer or a droplet of water that sits on the foil.
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