Could astronauts travel to Mars on nuclear-powered rockets? These scientists want to make it happen
September 25, 2025
Space missions in the future could travel to Mars, asteroids and the outer solar system by riding on nuclear-powered rockets, thanks to a new design that utilizes energy from the nuclear fission of liquid uranium to heat propellant.
The exciting potential of the new technology, which is called a centrifugal nuclear thermal rocket (CNTR), can be neatly summed up by its specific impulse, which…