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Flying with ionic wind

Aeroplanes use propellers and turbines, and are typically powered by fossil-fuel combustion. An alternative method of propelling planes has been demonstrated that does not require moving parts or combustion.
  1. Franck Plouraboué

    1. Franck Plouraboué is at the Institute of Fluid Mechanics of Toulouse, Toulouse University, CNRS, INPT, UPS, 31400 Toulouse, France.

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Small, lightweight devices called lifters can propel themselves into the air without combustion or moving parts, and have become a popular topic of discussion with technology buffs on social media in the past few years. And yet the physical mechanism behind lifters has been known for more than a century1. When charged molecules in the air are subjected to an electric field, they are accelerated. And when these charged molecules collide with neutral ones, they transfer part of their momentum, leading to air movement known as an ionic wind. On page 532, Xu et al.2 demonstrate that an aeroplane with a 5-metre wingspan can sustain steady-level flight using ionic-wind propulsion. Improvements are required, but the authors’ proof-of-concept demonstration could pave the way for the development of enhanced propulsion systems.

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Nature 563, 476-477 (2018)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-07411-z

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