Even today, these systems are not ready to be launched in space as they still lack a suitable compact power source offering enough energy density (such as hypothetical fusion reactors) to feed the power-greedy electromagnets, especially pulsed inductive ones. The rapid ablation of electrodes under the intense thermal flow is also a concern. For these reasons, studies remain largely theoretical and experiments are still conducted in the laboratory, although over 60 years have passed since the first research in this kind of thrusters.