Research in Hanspeter's Schaub's lab on real-life tractor beams is being highlighted in Live Science News.
The technology, more officially called an electro-static tractor, is a project of Schaub's Autonomous Vehicle Systems (AVS) laboratory.
Schaub, a professor and chair of the Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences, is an expert in charged astrodynamics and orbital mechanics.
If the team is successful, a key focus for the work would be alleviating the increasing problem of space junk -- derelict satellites and equipment cluttering up areas in Earth orbit.