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This Defense Intelligence Reference Document, dated 1 November 2010, was produced by the Defense Intelligence Agency under its Advanced Aerospace Weapon System Applications (AAWSA) Program. It surveys propulsion technologies that include chemical, ion, and nuclear fission rockets, fusion schemes, aneutronic fusion, and antimatter propulsion. It also covers radiation shielding and speculates on research needs over the next 30 years for missions from low Earth orbit to Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and Alpha Centauri. The document concludes that aneutronic fusion promises to be an important mechanism for future space propulsion.
UNCLASSIFIED/ ,'f811. lilffllilil.k l.llili 1iHlklC Table 2: Rest Mass of Various Subatomic Particles Subatomic Particle Particle Name Mass (amu) a alpha 4.001506 ~ beta 0.000549 ~ neutron 1.008665 p proton 1.007276 D deuterium 2.014102 T tritium 3.016049 U-235 uranium 235.0439 Gamma rays, or photons, have no rest mass and only move at the speed of light (c = 3 x 108 m/s). Photons do have an effective mass since their momentum is given by p = me = h/J,, where h is Planck's constant (h = 6.626 x 10-34 J•s) and ;\ is the wavelength of the photon. Particles also have energy, given by E = mc2. Mass (m) was defined in equation 1.4. Particle or photon energy is usually expressed in terms of electronvolts (eV). Typical powers of eV are also used, including keV (1,000 eV) and MeV (1 million eV). For reference, 1 eV = 1.602 x 10-19 joules. NUCLEAR FISSION ROCKETS During the Cold War, the United States and the USSR developed designs for intercontinental ballistic missiles to carry nuclear weapons. Conventional rockets used highly reactive chemicals and, as an alternative power source, the use of nuclear fission reactors was explored. Project Rover, supervised by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission and the U.S. Air Force, developed specialized fission reactors with hydrogen propellant. A number of nuclear rockets were built and tested at the DOE Nevada Test Site (NTS) Area 25 in the 1950s. Nuclear fission reactors require a "moderator" to operate. The moderator slows down neutrons generated by fission and absorbs their energy. Hydrogen is nearly the perfect moderator and was chosen as the moderator and the propellant in the construction of the NERVA (1) rockets under Project Rover. Figure 4 shows the main components of a nuclear fission rocket. 10 UNCLASSIFIED/ ,'1'81l 81'1'1@111it 1!1!11!! 8HLV
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Report, from the dia collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 50 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.