NASA plasma propulsion project promises Mars in a flash

Engineering research outfit Howe Industries is working with NASA to develop a new plasma-based propulsion system that might help solve the problem of moving around the solar system faster with bigger payloads. Early studies suggest the pulsed plasma rocket (PPR) propulsion system could produce up to 100,000 N of thrust within …

[Mike 137]

One stage on

I seem to remember that one of the shuttle crew described the experience as riding a firework with a can of petrol strapped to your back. This new propulsion system seems to take that one stage further -- something like "travelling in space with a nuclear bomb up your butt".

[Marcelo Rodrigues]

Re: One stage on

" something like "travelling in space with a nuclear bomb up your butt". "

Wouldn't that be the Orion project? With your but going up and down during it.

Sounds exhaustive, if You ask me.

[ecarlseen]

NASA loves its drawing boards

While this may be interesting in the long run, SpaceX will probably have humans doing round-trips to Mars before NASA actually builds one.

[Anonymous Coward]

outside Earth's protective dome

Dome? Dome! DOME!!

Ha!!! Knew it!!!! Eventually the facade would crack!!!!! The Truth would out!!!!!! The world is covered by a dome!!!!!!! Made of fluffy blue meringue!!!!!!!!! All those rockets have gone up and are stuck in it!!!!!!!!!! Which causes clouds until the food colouring covers it up again!!!!!!!!!!! Just like planes scrape against it!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love, Chris, "CC", from New York, Westchester County

PS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[eldel]

Re: outside Earth's protective dome

I give it less than 5 hours before this appears on Reddit as a proof of flat earth.

[Version 1.0]

"manned missions to Mars to be completed within a mere two months"

That would be amazing in the current environment although that might be two months to get there, two months to explore, and then two more months to get home. That would be a big improvement on today's estimates but let's just watch the history of traveling improve if we can eventually get up to light speed then we might start to visit the universe.

[David Newall]

Re: "manned missions to Mars to be completed within a mere two months"

Even if we could get to light speed, which seems incredibly unlikely, that still makes the trip to our closest neighbour more than 4 years. We're over 620 light years from Betelgeuse and 28,000 light years from galactic centre.

Space is big, really big, and even at light speed, we're going nowhere.

[timrowledge]

Re: "manned missions to Mars to be completed within a mere two months"

Time dilation. 4 years is not.... 4 years . There’s an equation. No, I don’t remember it at this time of night.

[DJO]

Re: "manned missions to Mars to be completed within a mere two months"

If I remember correctly it's a variation on the Lorentz equation. Something like the reciprocal of the square root of 1 minus v squared over c squared.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: "manned missions to Mars to be completed within a mere two months"

Time dilation. 4 years is not.... 4 years . There’s an equation. No, I don’t remember it at this time of night.

No, me neither, but I do seem to remember that travelling at a speed of around 90% of the speed of light gives you a Lorentz factor of about 2 i.e. 4 static observer years becomes 2 years aboard the spacecraft.

[Mike 137]

Re: "manned missions to Mars to be completed within a mere two months"

"Time dilation. 4 years is not.... 4 years"

From your perspective at lightspeed if it's a one way trip. But if you're planning on coming back you'll find it hard to re-adjust from 'short' trips and from longer trips you might even find this planet unrecognisable. For a clear exposition of the cultural problems, see Larry Niven's short story 'Rammer'.¹

Oh, and for really long trips (even one way), given the delay between cosmic events and us seeing them plus the actual trip time², there's a possibility that the world you'd be aiming for might not even exist any more once you'd reached its nominal vicinity.

_{1: yes, I know the initial time shift wasn't due to FTL travel, but the cultural principle remains valid}

_{2: you, in your spacecraft may experience time dilation, but cosmic events proceed independently in normal time}

.

[Greybearded old scrote]

Re: "manned missions to Mars to be completed within a mere two months"

Or try here.

[PerlyKing]

Re: "Rammer"

See also Joe Haldeman's "The Forever War".

[STOP_FORTH]

Travel advice

I'd stay well away from Betelgeuse if I were you.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Travel advice

I'd stay well away from Betelgeuse if I were you.

And whatever you do, don't say it three times in a row...

[DJO]

Re: "manned missions to Mars to be completed within a mere two months"

It is impossible for any craft that carries its own fuel and reaction mass to get anywhere near the speed of light. The energy required increase exponentially and there is no fuel, not even antimatter, that will do the job without the amount of fuel required being orders of magnitude greater than the mass of the spacecraft.

We need to find some way to extract energy from open space before we can think about crossing the cosmos.

Sorry, it's a bit depressing but that's physics for you.

[MacroRodent]

Re: "manned missions to Mars to be completed within a mere two months"

Many a science fiction story gets around this with the "Buzzard ramjet" that runs on interstellar hydrogen. If it worked, it would be able to accelerate forever. See "Tau Zero" by Poul Anderson, where this idea is taken to infinity, and beyond...

[DJO]

Re: "manned missions to Mars to be completed within a mere two months"

It's a "Bussard" and the energy required to form one would far exceed anything usable as fuel you could collect in it. If you had unlimited energy it would be a useful way to gather reaction mass.

Using a Bussard as a ramjet type of propulsion as opposed to a mass collector has a pretty major flaw apart from the prestigious energy requirements. It does not work in reverse, you cannot use it to decelerate when you get to (and zoom past) your destination.

Hydrogen on it's own is not a particularly useful fuel, you can't burn it without some form of oxidant. Some will be deuterium (or tritium if you're really lucky) but not enough to run a fusion reactor otherwise it's really only useful as reaction mass.

Look to the Culture series by Iain M Banks, he had some form of energy grid "above" and "below" space which could be tapped for unlimited energy and traction. Could we tap the Higgs field in a similar way? Almost certainly not but it's worth a look to make sure. For really silly ways to cross the cosmos look at anything by Harry Harrison.

If we want the stars we have to look at all the daft ideas until we find the one that isn't as stupid as it first seemed - we have to abandon Newtonian propulsion and interact directly with spacetime - many a Nobel up for grabs for anyone who works out how to do that.

[CR]

Re: "manned missions to Mars to be completed within a mere two months"

Discussing about light years, but no one speaking about those hard years we have lately...

[Sam 15]

Re: "manned missions to Mars to be completed within a mere two months"

"but let's just watch the history of traveling improve if we can eventually get up to light speed then we might start to visit the universe."

Quite. We should ignore trivial details like accelerating up to light speed... and decelerating when approaching the destination.

Of course, getting close to the speed of light is a weighty issue.

[Johannesburgel12]

Repost?

The exact same press release was published back in 2020:

https://www.nasa.gov/general/pulsed-plasma-rocket-shielded-fast-transits-for-humans-to-mars/

The only difference is in the amount if thrust.

[Anonymous Coward]

Correct understanding of units please

The NASA article states that the proposed engine has a thrust of 100,000N and a specific impulse of 5000 s. The specific impulse is a measure of how much thrust you can get from your fuel. For the record, 5000s is roughly comparable with the combination of aviation fuel and the sort of turbofan engine you find on an airliner (i.e. pretty efficient)

[NXM]

PuFF

Excellent work, acronym inventors.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: PuFF

Well, it sounds like magic, but sometimes the work seems to drag on.