The US Army is Building Drones That Never Need To Land (technologyreview.com)

Posted by msmash on Tuesday September 4, 2018 @02:46AM from the how-about-that dept.

It's using lasers to power the aerial machines. An anonymous reader writes: According to New Scientist [paywalled], the US Army is firing lasers at photovoltaic cells on drones to deliver power from a distance. Eventually they hope to power the devices from 500 meters away. How it works: The method is similar to the way University of Washington researchers are powering their mini insect robots. The process creates a lot of heat, which could risk melting the drone. And lasers come with additional risks.

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Lasermotive did this already by XXongo · 2018-09-04 03:52 · Score: 4, Informative

I should note that Lasermotive (now renamed "Powerlight Technologies") did that laser-powered-drone demonstration several years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
(home page: https://powerlighttech.com/ )