To reduce the radiation hazard for manned missions to Mars and beyond, a high-specific-impulse–high-thrust system is needed, with a nuclear bomb propulsion system the preferred candidate. The propulsion with small fission bombs is excluded because the critical mass requirement leads to extravagant small fission burnup rates. This leaves open the propulsion with nonfission ignited thermonuclear microexplosions, with a compact fusion microexplosion igniter (driver) and no large radiator. It should not depend on the rare He 3 isotope and only requires a small amount of tritium. This excludes lasers for ignition. With megaamperes of gigavolt proton beams and a small amount of tritium, cylindrical deuterium targets can be ignited. The proton beams are generated by discharging the entire spacecraft as a magnetically insulated gigavolt capacitor. To avoid a large radiator, needed to remove the heat from the absorption of the fast neutrons in the spacecraft, the microexplosion is surrounded by a thick layer of liquid hydrogen, stopping the neutrons and heating the hydrogen to a temperature of 10 5 K , which as a fully ionized plasma can be repelled from the spacecraft by a magnetic mirror.


    Zugriff

    Zugriff prüfen

    Verfügbarkeit in meiner Bibliothek prüfen

    Bestellung bei Subito €


    Exportieren, teilen und zitieren



    Titel :

    To Mars in Weeks by Thermonuclear Microbomb Propulsion


    Beteiligte:
    Winterberg, F. (Autor:in)

    Erschienen in:

    Erscheinungsdatum :

    2014-09-10


    Format / Umfang :

    5 pages




    Medientyp :

    Aufsatz (Zeitschrift)


    Format :

    Elektronische Ressource


    Sprache :

    Englisch




    Simplest AB-thermonuclear space propulsion and electric generator

    Bolonkin, Alexander | Emerald Group Publishing | 2008


    Simplest AB-thermonuclear space propulsion and electric generator

    Bolonkin, Alexander | Online Contents | 2008


    Mars Lander Propulsion

    Wrobel, J. Richard | SAE Technical Papers | 1968


    Mars lander propulsion.

    Wrobel, J. R. | NTRS | 1968


    Nuclear-electric propulsion - Manned Mars propulsion options

    Palaszewski, Bryan / Brophy, John / King, David | NTRS | 1989