NASA Seeks a Nuclear-Powered Rocket to Get to Mars in Half the Time

A Quantity That Sums It Up: 3 to 4 months to Mars

What if a spacecraft may get to Mars in half the time it at the moment takes?

Each 26 months or so, Mars and Earth are shut sufficient for a shorter journey between the worlds. However even then it’s a fairly lengthy journey, lasting seven to 9 months. For more often than not, the spacecraft is simply coasting by area.

But when the spacecraft may proceed accelerating by the primary half of the journey after which begin slowing down once more, the journey time could possibly be slashed. Present rocket engines, which generally depend on the combustion of a gas like hydrogen or methane with oxygen, should not environment friendly sufficient to perform that; there’s not sufficient room within the spacecraft to hold that a lot propellant.

However nuclear reactions, producing vitality from the splitting of uranium atoms, are way more environment friendly.

The DRACO engine would encompass a nuclear reactor that may warmth hydrogen from a cold minus 420 levels Fahrenheit to a toasty 4,400 levels, with the new gasoline capturing from a nozzle to generate thrust. Better gas effectivity may pace up journeys to Mars, lowering the period of time astronauts spend uncovered to the treacherous surroundings of deep area.

Nuclear propulsion may even have makes use of nearer to dwelling, which is why DARPA is investing within the challenge. The expertise could enable speedy maneuvers of army satellites in orbit round Earth.

Background: Again to the long run

Nuclear propulsion for area shouldn’t be a brand new concept. Within the Fifties and Nineteen Sixties, Challenge Orion — financed by NASA, the Air Drive and the Superior Analysis Tasks Company — contemplated utilizing the explosions of atomic bombs to speed up spacecraft.

On the identical time, NASA and different companies additionally undertook Challenge Rover and Challenge NERVA, efforts that aimed to develop nuclear-thermal engines related in idea to these now being pursued by the DRACO program. A sequence of 23 reactors have been constructed and examined, however none have been ever launched to area. Till the tip of this program in 1973, NASA had contemplated utilizing nuclear reactors to propel area probes to Jupiter, Saturn and past, in addition to to offer energy at a lunar base.

“The technical capabilities, together with early security protocols, stay viable right now,” Tabitha Dodson, the DRACO challenge supervisor, mentioned in a information briefing on Wednesday.

A key distinction between NERVA and DRACO is that NERVA used weapons-grade uranium for its reactors, whereas DRACO will use a less-enriched type of uranium.

The reactor wouldn’t be turned on till it reached area, a part of the precautions to attenuate the potential of a radioactive accident on Earth.

“DRACO has already finished all of our preliminary analyses throughout the complete spectrum of potentialities for accidents and located that we’re all the best way down within the low likelihood and all the best way down within the teeny tiny quantity of launch,” Dr. Dodson mentioned.

What Occurs Subsequent: A check flight in orbit

The DRACO improvement is to culminate with a flight check of the nuclear-thermal engine. The launch is at the moment scheduled for late 2026 or early 2027.

The demonstration spacecraft would most certainly orbit at an altitude between 435 and 1,240 miles, Dr. Dodson mentioned. That’s excessive sufficient to make sure that it stays in orbit for greater than 300 years, or lengthy sufficient for radioactive components within the reactor gas to decay to secure ranges, she mentioned.