Tens of thousands of satellites are to be launched in the near future, for various purposes. Elon Musk’s satellite-based internet service company, Starlink, alone plans to put up 48,000 satellites. All these earth-orbiters will encounter one big problem (and later contribute to it too): space debris. There are at least 27,000 catalogued space debris out there, according to NASA, the US space agency, some as tiny as paint chips, but deadly nevertheless, for they are moving at incredible speeds.

Now, a Japanese company called Astroscale has come up with a space-sweeper—a satellite that is designed to drag space debris lower, where the debris will burn to dust due to friction with the earth’s atmosphere. Astroscale successfully conducted its first test last week. Space is mostly vacuum, but when we litter it, we still need a vacuum cleaner.