The travel path that ISRO’s Mars orbiter took to reach the Red Planet was inspired by a maneuver described nearly a century earlier by Walter Hohmann, an architect whose hobby was celestial mechanics.

Both Earth and Mars have (almost) circular orbits and a maneuver known as the Hohmann transfer is the most fuel-efficient way to travel between two planets. Basically, without going into too much ...

Do that and your spacecraft will miss Mars. So, rocket scientists use a maneuver called a Hohmann transfer orbit to send a vehicle from a small circular orbit (say, Earth’s) to a larger one ...

Editorial writer and columnist specializing in domestic policy and politics James Hohmann is a Washington Post editorial writer and columnist specializing in domestic policy and politics.

The engines fire to do a maneuver that increases the speed of ... This is much safer than a Hohmann transfer, in which spacecraft need to substantially slow down using their engines, which can ...

On this episode, The Washington Post's Rhonda Colvin, James Hohmann and JM Rieger break down whether President Trump has a plan to enact his biggest policy priorities – or if major changes to ...