Successful NASP developments in the United States are bringing about the possibility of effective, fully reusable vehicles for transport of people and cargo between earth and space. These developments include: extension of airbreathing propulsion to a much higher speed; densification of propellants for greater energy per unit volume of mass; structures with much greater strength-to-weight at high temperatures; computational advancements that enable more optimal design and integration of airframes, engines and controls; and advances in avionics, robotics, artificial intelligence and automation that enable accomplishment of earth-to-orbit (ETO) operations with much less manpower support and cost. This paper describes the relative magnitude of improvement that these developments may provide.
NASP - Enabling new space launch options
1990-10-01
Conference paper
No indication
English
NASP - Enabling new space launch options
AIAA | 1990
|NASP - Enabling a new space launch architecture
AIAA | 1990
|AIAA | 1989
|National Aero-Space Plane (NASP) program
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