Scientists propose combining laser and telescope system to zap space debris into oblivion

04/22/2015 - 00:00


An international team of scientists have put forward a blueprint for a purely space-based system to solve the growing problem of space debris. The proposal, published in Acta Astronautica, combines a super-wide field-of-view telescope, developed by RIKEN's EUSO team, which will be used to detect objects, and a recently developed high-efficiency laser system, the CAN laser that was presented in Nature Photonics in 2013, that will be used to track space debris and remove it from orbit.

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Ref:  Demonstration designs for the remediation of space debris from the International Space Station. Acta Astronautica (2015) | DOI: 10.1016/j.actaastro.2015.03.004