NASA Funding Tractor Beam Study

While we're a ways off from Star Trek or Star Wars, three promising experiments could help us gather molecules from other planets' atmospheres.

NASA has thrown $100,000 toward researchers who are working on developing tractor beams, the sci-fi technology that helps space craft land using lasers or the Force or something. NASA researcher Paul Stysley will put the money toward finding out whether three different kinds of tractor beams could actually be put to use in grabbing samples of molecules in space and on other planets. One method traps small objects in the focus of a laser, while the other two methods rely on lasers with distinct shapes, such as a spiral, that could be better suited to moving objects than the traditional straight beam. Stysley hopes to find out which of the latter two methods might work best in space, as the first method is believed to only work when an atmosphere is present. Being able to grab and study molecules out of thin air (or out of the vacuum that is space) could help broaden our understanding of the chemical makeup of other planets and our solar system. That, and some day we ought to be able to pull the Millennium Falcon into our Death Star, otherwise you never know what those pesky rebels could be capable of.