SpaceX had to destack and replace a grid fin actuator. The FAA license has been granted but SpaceX is now targeting a 20 minute window start at 7 AM Central time on Saturday. Starship stacked for flight. This is another chance to put Starship in a true flight environment, maximizing how much we learn. Rapid …
Nuclear Thermal Propulsion (NTP) is one of the best options for manned missions throughout the solar system with over double the ISP of chemical rockets. A new NASA NIAC study will look at improved nuclear propulsion with a Wave Rotor combined with Nuclear Electric. This could enable four times the ISP of nuclear thermal and …
The future of space-based UV/optical/IR astronomy requires ever larger telescopes. A NASA NIAC Phase 1 study will look at a space observatory with a large-aperture (50-meter) unsegmented primary mirror suitable for a variety of astronomical applications. The mirror would be created in space via a novel approach based on fluidic shaping in microgravity, which has …
NASA has a phase 1 NIAC (NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts) to overcome the limitations for making giant lightweight dish structures in space. In this NIAC effort, they aim to overcome limitations by using a novel in-space manufacturing method and advanced materials to fabricate high-performance reflectors with dimensions greater than 100 meters, 100 m/m surface precision, …
A Phase 1 NASA NIAC study will demonstrate the feasibility of a revolutionary power source for missions to the outer planets utilizing a new paradigm in thermal power conversion, the thermoradiative cell (TRC). This device, driven by a radioisotope heat source, will allow an order of magnitude increase in mass specific power (~30 vs ~3 …
NASA NIAC phase 1 studies development of a nuclear fission fragment rocket engine (FFRE) that is exponentially more propellent efficient than rocket engines currently used to power today’s space vehicles and could achieve very high specific impulse (>100,000 sec) at high power density (>kW/kg). Fission Fragment rockets are several proposed nuclear rocket designs made since …
NASA NIAC has a phase 1 study for Artur Davoyan to study propulsion architecture for fast transit of heavy (1 ton and more) payloads across the solar system and to interstellar medium. This version of a pellet beams approach allow for larger vehicles to reach speeds nine times faster than Voyager 1. Inspired by the …
Ivan Ermanoski, Arizona State University, has NASA NIAC funding to evaluate, computationally and experimentally, the feasibility of a process–thermal swing sorption/desorption (TSSD)–to generate oxygen from the Mars atmosphere with 10x less energy than the state of the art, and bring other breakthrough performance improve-ments. The basis for TSSD is a two-step thermally-driven cycle operating below …
Slava G. Turyshev and his team are on their phase III NASA NIAC project to develop a solar gravitational lens telescope. At optical or near-optical wavelengths, the amplification of light is on the order of 200 billion times and with equally impressive angular resolution. If we can reach this region beginning at 550 AU from …
NASA Advanced Concepts has funded research for a high performance spacesuit for future Mars Astronauts. Dr. Bonnie Dunbar is a former NASA astronaut and is now a professor of Aerospace Engineering at Texas A&M. Some of her fellow astronauts couldn’t fit in an Extra Vehicular Activity suit – more commonly known as a spacesuit. Her …
Philip Lubin has been funded by NASA NIAC to study a practical and effective method of planetary asteroid defense that allows for extremely short mitigation time scales if required. The method involves an array of small hypervelocity kinetic penetrators that pulverize and disassemble an asteroid or small comet. This effectively mitigates the threat using the …