Get the latest tech news
NASA's Proposed Plasma Rocket Would Get Us to Mars in 2 Months
The space agency is investing in the development of a propulsion system that uses nuclear power to create plasma bursts.
The new “science fiction-like concepts,” as described by John Nelson, NIAC program executive at NASA, include a lunar railway system and fluid-based telescopes, as well as a pulsed plasma rocket. Using the new propulsion system, and in terms of thrust, the rocket could potentially generate up to 22,481 pounds of force (100,000 Newtons) with a specific impulse (Isp) of 5,000 seconds, for remarkably high fuel efficiency. PuFF relied on a device commonly used to compress laboratory plasmas to high pressures for very short timescales, called z-Pinch, to produce thrust.
Or read this on Hacker News
