Propulsion by a Gaseous Fission Reactor.

H. W. Hubbard, Albert L. Latter, E. A. Martinelli

ResearchPublished 1963

A reexamination of the gaseous fission reactor prompted by recent interest in such a reactor at the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory. Such a reexamination made at LRL came to the conclusion that a Mars trip--mission speed about 30 km/sec-would be impossibly expensive in oralloy-on the order of 5 to 10 thousand tons. In this Memorandum, the authors show that by using a cold D 0 reflector, instead of hot graphite, and by operating at a much higher pressure, the oralloy expenditure for the same mission can be reduced to about 15 tons, more or less independently of payload. They state that such a cost is probably small compared to the other costs involved in the system.

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  • Copyright: RAND Corporation
  • Availability: Available
  • Year: 1963
  • Print Format: Paperback
  • Paperback Pages: 14
  • Paperback Price: $20.00
  • Document Number: RM-3769-AEC

Citation

RAND Style Manual
Hubbard, H. W., Albert L. Latter, and E. A. Martinelli, Propulsion by a Gaseous Fission Reactor. RAND Corporation, RM-3769-AEC, 1963. As of September 5, 2024: https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_memoranda/RM3769.html
Chicago Manual of Style
Hubbard, H. W., Albert L. Latter, and E. A. Martinelli, Propulsion by a Gaseous Fission Reactor. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 1963. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_memoranda/RM3769.html. Also available in print form.
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