From the New York Post: "New rocket tech could significantly reduce travel time to Mars, NASA claims: ‘Next giant leap’." The article discusses NASA's nuclear-electric powered lithium ion thrusters. The article relates:
NASA Marshall said on Monday the agency recently completed testing of a lithium-fed electromagnetic thruster, reaching more than five times the power of existing electric propulsion systems.
Paired with a nuclear power source, the new tech could significantly shorten the time it takes to reach the Red Planet, potentially cutting months off the journey.
[snip]
The electromagnetic thruster running on lithium metal vapour was tested at power levels exceeding any previous test in the United States.
During the test, the team achieved power levels of up to 120 kilowatts, over 25 times the power of the thrusters on Psyche, which is currently operating the highest-power electric thrusters of any NASA spacecraft.
In the vacuum of space, the force Psyche’s thrusters provide over time accelerates the spacecraft to 124,000 mph.
This would reduce a one-way trip to Mars to only 3 months.
Ion drive, eh? You want a Death Star? This is how you get a Death Star. All kidding aside, all we need is cheap delta V and we're at Mars in weeks. Fusion. Only 20 years, I hear. (I read that in 1980).
ReplyDeleteThere are some designs for nuclear rockets that would get us there faster, as well. But now that researchers are getting away from the tokamak design, we seem to be seeing some real advances in fusion.
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