New Rocket Engine Could Reach Mars in 40 Days

New Rocket Engine Could Reach Mars in 40 Days

www.space.com

Future Mars outposts or colonies may seem more distant than ever with NASA's exploration plans in flux, but the rocket technology that could someday propel a human mission to the red planet in as little as 40 days may already exist.

A company founded by former NASA astronaut Franklin Chang-Diaz has been developing a new rocket engine that draws upon electric power and magnetic fields to channel superheated plasma out the back. That stream of plasma generates steady, efficient thrust that uses low amounts of propellant and builds up speed over time.

(visit the link for the full news article)

Wow! .. if this actually works and mankind can then travel to Mars in a little over 1 month that would be awesome!

If I'm not mistaken, current technologies would only get us there in 6 months - so 1.3 months of travel time vs. 6 months is a magnificent leap ahead for us, I hope it becomes a reality!...

www.space.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

That's amazing! I'd love to see Mars and the Moon in that time...but I guess the big question is "how expensive is it"? I know NASA is on a shorter lease now.

This isn't exactly the first time the engine has seen press release, rather it's picking up more media attention as time progresses. I think the first time I've caught wind of this plasma engine mentioned in articles was in Oct 09. I find it slightly amusing that when I talk to people about spaceflight and why it "isn't Important" in their opinions, one of the first things they bring up is the practicality. "It will take a gillions years to reach so and so", which is true using a principle based on early 1900's technology (or millenniums considering chinese history). Most people don't think of the potential for human spaceflight simply because they are uninformed of it (or leaving it to a defunct NASA).

Honestly I think rockets are the most inefficient, resource hogging, logically impractical way possible to achieve spaceflight. opposed to other ways of acquiring orbit, most space agencies rather construct a giant tube fill it with thousands of pounds of fuel and ignite it. Once reaching a certain altitude a portion of that tube is ejected from the main spacecraft (despite all the financial effort it took to construct that single piece alone ). With multi-stage rockets wash, rinse, repeat. Sounds efficient right?

whoever purposed that crazy idea, I'll purpose another...... a single staged, reusable space craft. Hell lets take baby steps. lets construct a giant F16. after reaching a certain altitude we'll launch the crew in a giant missile out into space with life support systems.

flagged, really interesting..itd be great if they funded space travel more than they fund wars. and itd be nice to be able to go on mars! unless...we are already there with secret bases and alien technology and the government hides it from us..and that is a conspiracy itself!

flagged, really interesting..itd be great if they funded space travel more than they fund wars. and itd be nice to be able to go on mars! unless...we are already there with secret bases and alien technology and the government hides it from us..and that is a conspiracy itself!

Thats awesome, Thank you for bringing it to my attention =)

Chemical rockets seem so, oldschool now, Even though its all we use.
The imagination is a wonderful thing, i just wish people would indulge in it more, and noodle it out

(hope that made sense!)
(Just woke up lol)

reply to post by DarkspARCS


Wow, good find! Looks like halting our government space program and handing it over to the private industry could pay off.

At the bottom of the article it says,

"Anybody who wants to send anything to ISS after the shuttle retires is talking with SpaceX, and Orbital Sciences."

Orbital Sciences (ORB) is on the NASDAQ and SpaceX is privately traded. My money would be on them because the Ad Astra Rocket Company, the company that makes this new (VASIMR) Variable Sypecific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket, can't get into space by themselves. Although, Ad Astra Rocket Company would be a good bet too.

This is definitely an exciting time for the space industry, hopefully we can send missions to other planets in the near future. I am extremely amped for us to send man missions to other planets in our solar system during my lifetime.

Ad Astra Rocket Company (AARC) is a spaceflight engineering company dedicated to the development of advanced plasma rocket propulsion technology. The company is developing the Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket (VASIMR®) and its associated technologies.

The company is located 3 miles to the West of the NASA Johnson Space Center, and about 25 miles to the South of the city of Houston, TX. AARC was incorporated on January 14th, 2005 and officially organized on the 15th of July of 2005.

Dr. Franklin R. Chang Díaz serves as company President and CEO. Dr. Chang Díaz invented the VASIMR® concept and has been working on its development since 1979, starting at The Charles Stark Draper Laboratory in Cambridge Massachusetts and continuing at the MIT Plasma Fusion Center before moving the project to the Johnson Space Center in 1994.

In the development of the VASIMR® engine, Ad Astra Rocket Company has collaborated with NASA Johnson Space Center, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, University of Texas at Austin, University of Houston and various other government space and research.

A lot of a NASA scientists probably left NASA to form their own companies and space products. Maybe one day in the near future, we will all be able to go into outerspace and travel to other planets within our solar system. 40 days is not that long in travel to another planet if you think about it. It use to take us a few months to travel the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.

[edit on 6-3-2010 by tooo many pills]

Great to Mars in 40 days. I will volunteer to go and when we land on the surface of Mars I will not need a space suit because I will be able to breath as a human back on Earth. We have been duped believe it or not. ^Y^

There are a lot of neat ideas on engines for space travel, personally my favorite is the Ramjet Engin it uses hydrogen the most abundant resource in the universe as fuel, pretty cool huh?

search for VASIMR, there is a lot of information on the (not so) new tech.

Really awesome stuff. This kind of thing brings me such hope. If the private sector can start to develop this technology I think we are in for a proper space race.

A great idea for these companies would be to open up their testing of this stuff to the public at large.

I for one would happily volunteer, without pay, to test this stuff in space.

Obviously there are risks involved, and I'd sign a waiver to that effect, but it would also allow the development of this stuff to be speeded up massively.

Sadly though, no one is likely to take any notice of this, and we'll crawl around in the "dark ages" for another millennia.

This news is not exactly new, but whatever engine that will get humans faster to mars will be welcomed. And I'm looking forward to see this technology in action.

a new rocket engine that draws upon electric power and magnetic fields to channel superheated plasma out the back. That stream of plasma generates steady, efficient thrust that uses low amounts of propellant and builds up speed over time.

Right, they just havent worked out how they will slow down/stop yet.

Originally posted by amari
Great to Mars in 40 days. I will volunteer to go and when we land on the surface of Mars I will not need a space suit because I will be able to breath as a human back on Earth. We have been duped believe it or not. ^Y^

"Lock in "NOT", for me Eddie."

ref Eddie:

Eddie McGuire
Host of Australia's 'Who wants to be a millionaire'.

Should do a search, this has been discussed here before.www.abovetopsecret.com...
Several plasma devices are already in space. The ones that come to mind are Deep Space One, Hayabusa, and Dawn.

Originally posted by rleexray
Should do a search, this has been discussed here before.www.abovetopsecret.com...
Several plasma devices are already in space. The ones that come to mind are Deep Space One, Hayabusa, and Dawn.

Gees, DOES SOMEONE HAVE TO IMMEDIATELY GET ONTO EVERY DAMN THREAD I MAKE NEWS WITH AND REDIRECT THE PEOPLE SOMEWHERE ELSE?!

I need to talk to Max, this has gotten way out of hand.

look rleexray, at this point I DONT CARE about the link you just slammed into my thread, and I actually really dont care that you try to tell me what I should or should not have done - in your eyes.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS RELEASE AS IT HAS BEEN RELEASED *TODAY* ON SPACE.COM...

Do you understand? What Canada and others have done etc etc - which is what the post you have redirected traffic to is talking about - hasn't got a damn thing to do with NASA's new direction, nor the new spin they are putting on an already established launcher.

Can Canada get American Astronaughts to Mars in +/- 40 days?

Man, I gotta talk to Max..... lol

reply to post by DarkspARCS


40 days? Damn, that is freaking fast..

Distance from Earth to Mars: 54.6 million km.

40 X 24 = 960 hrs.

Travelling 54.6 million km in 960 hrs...

That is about 5000 km/hr. Dang, that is very freaking fast..

Ouch, what happens to frictions? I'm not familiar with space flight but is there friction in space? I know there is no sound, because there is no media for sound waves to travel through, does that also mean there is no friction?


I think this is possible.. NASA sux, a NASA employee did better than NASA.

Ouch, what happens to frictions? I'm not familiar with space flight but is there friction in space? I know there is no sound, because there is no media for sound waves to travel through, does that also mean there is no friction?

Correct, No friction in space because its a vacume, thats why meteorites only begin to burn up once they breach our atmosphere.
Im not sure I know enough about accelleration G-forces in space flight to comment on that aspect, but It might be interesting to hear about.



[edit on 7-3-2010 by wayaboveitall]

reply to post by wayaboveitall


cool, thanks, and that is very interesting indeed.