Documents / Report
This Defense Intelligence Agency reference document, dated 1 November 2010, is one of a series of advanced technology reports produced in FY 2010 under the Advanced Aerospace Weapons System Applications (AAWSA) Program. It covers fusion plasma physics, confinement methods, and propulsion concepts that use aneutronic fuels such as hydrogen and boron-11. It concludes that such thrusters may soon replace satellite ion thrusters. It also finds that they will not be practical beyond the solar system without breakthrough propulsion physics.
“The Advance”7 pages
UNCLASSIFIED//P9R: 9PPll!ltllt '11815 8Htlf the MeV alpha particles for the (p, 11 B) into a direct thrust would increase the lsp to >5,000 seconds with thrust levels >5 N/kW. \ Acceleratmg • 1\-- Gnd / Plasma Jet Insulator E\edF>n Emitters ~---r..•• I I •_/---..-l_ Elertron __,..,/ _/ - Guide -/ + 100 V Figure 13. Design of an IEC Jet Thruster - Experimental Device (left) INTERPLANETARY Many of the fusion reactor applications described in Chapter 3 have been specifically applied to space propulsion. The key reason for the benefits of such systems lies in the fundamentally different nature of fusion propulsion compared to chemical or nuclear- thermal propulsion. Fusion propulsion systems pay a mass penalty for carrying their power source. However, a propellant mass savings results from the high thrust per unit mass that arises from high exhaust velocity that overcomes the power-source mass penalty. These potential performance enhancements are shown in Figure 14, which illustrates fusion propulsion's capabilities for fast transport of humans or efficient transport of cargo between circular solar orbits for Earth-Mars one-way rendezvous missions. 18 In order to achieve the efficient solar system travel shown in Figure 14, propulsion systems must achieve specific powers of at least 1 kW/kg at exhaust velocities of ~10 5 - 106 m/s, leading to thrust-to-weight ratios of ~10- 3 . The required range of parameters and a comparison with chemical and nuclear thermal propulsion options appears in Figure 15. 19 The capability of tuning the exhaust velocity over factors of 10-100 is a desirable feature that facilitates energy intensive missions. For the same delivered payload the fraction of the propellant and nonpayload mass is significantly minimized for fusion propulsion as compared to the other propulsion options. 18 UNCLASSIFIED/ )F81il 8ffll!ltllt tl31!! OICLI
Not linked to a story yet.
Report, from the dia collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 36 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.