[Ditroi]

My sister talked about doing work for it a while back. Not sure what role she played. She mentioned the idea coming from ST.

Found an article from 2007 to introduce the idea:
Ion Propulsion: From Star Trek to NASA


From April 2009:
NASA Trumps Star Trek: Ion Drive Live!

[sraviik]

awesome! perhaps someday we'll have warp to go with our new ion drives

[FanWriter45]

Um... "Ion Drives" have been a staple in science fiction since at least the early 1930's. The basic idea behind the "electric rocket" is an old one that actually was first suggested (although not in it's current form) by Tesla at the turn of the century. We have actualy been using "ion thrusters" on satillites since shortly after TELSTAR, as ACS thrusters. Only in the late 1980's and early 1990's have this very old idea been used for actual propulsion in cometary probes like DS-1 or the lunar SMART probes.