I’ve grown up with rockets that burn chemical fuel, but NASA’s next big leap in propulsion could make those engines look as dated as steam trains. By turning to nuclear power in space, the agency is ...

The USA's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has finalised an agreement with Lockheed Martin to begin work on the fabrication and design of an experimental nuclear thermal rocket and its engine ...

Humanity has lived in the space age for decades, but virtually every probe, rocket, and satellite shaping this era has relied on chemical propulsion. As scientists and engineers eye more distant ...

Jim Bickford is leading the Thin Film Isotope Nuclear Engine Rocket (TFINER) project to develop a system for propelling a craft through space faster and farther than ever before. This technology has ...

Viewed from orbit, Jackass Flats — situated in southern Nevada about 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas — could easily be confused for Mars. The alluvial basin is full of tan and gray regolith, hued ...

Angry Astronaut and Nextbigfuture commenter are making the case that SpaceX and Elon Musk must switch to nuclear thermal rockets to colonize Mars. I will review that the nuclear thermal rocket program ...

Introduction -- Rocket engine fundamentals -- Nuclear rocket engine cycles -- Interplanetary mission analysis -- Basic nuclear structure and processes -- Neutron flux energy distribution -- Neutron ...

Fundamentals of thermodynamics and aerodynamics -- Thermodynamic cycle analysis of gas turbines and air-breathing propulsion systems -- Aerodynamic design of axial flow compressors and turbines -- ...

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The Space Age framed nuclear propulsion as a quiet rethinking of movement, distance, and endurance beyond Earth.

The rise of the commercial space industry precipitated a steeper decline at Rocketdyne. Boeing sold the Rocketdyne division ...

NASA’s push for a new nuclear rocket engine is not just another upgrade to the hardware we strap to the bottom of spacecraft. It is an attempt to rewrite the basic rules of how far, how fast, and how ...