Why dont they build a fusion powered rocket. They could build small pellets out of Hf178 that has been pumped to a higher energy state. The pellets would be hollow and be filled with deturium and tritium. It would be encased in U238 with holes milled in it. The pellets could be shot into a chamber then a high powered x-ray laser would be shot through the holes in the casing and on the Hf178. The Hf178 would go back to its normal energy level and release gamma rays. The gamma rays would compress the hydrogen and make it fuse into helium releasing a few neutrons. The heat would vaporize the hafnium and uranium casing and the helium left over could act to as a moderator to slow down the neutrons. The chamber would be sealed off and cooled with liquid hydrogen. Then the hydrogen would flow through a series of hollow plates in the reactor and the extremely hot hydrogen acts as the propellant. The reactor itself could be made of tungsten. The reactor would have small holes milled in it to let the products of the reaction escape. It wold be fired in space only but could be put in space by building a thermal nuclear rocket engine into it.
chadroper wrote: Why dont they build a fusion powered rocket. They could build small pellets out of Hf178 that has been pumped to a higher energy state. The pellets would be hollow and be filled with deturium and tritium. It would be encased in U238 with holes milled in it. The pellets could be shot into a chamber then a high powered x-ray laser would be shot through the holes in the casing and on the Hf178. The Hf178 would go back to its normal energy level and release gamma rays. The gamma rays would compress the hydrogen and make it fuse into helium releasing a few neutrons. The heat would vaporize the hafnium and uranium casing and the helium left over could act to as a moderator to slow down the neutrons. The chamber would be sealed off and cooled with liquid hydrogen. Then the hydrogen would flow through a series of hollow plates in the reactor and the extremely hot hydrogen acts as the propellant. The reactor itself could be made of tungsten. The reactor would have small holes milled in it to let the products of the reaction escape. It wold be fired in space only but could be put in space by building a thermal nuclear rocket engine into it.
and how do you plan to exactly contain the estimated 10 million degrees celcius that appears in a nuclear fusion reactor. tungsten if i am not mistaken can only resist perhaps 5,000 degrees before it melts. furthermore, there is a need of even higher temperature needed to be placed in for the nuclear reactor, and some speculate it would be as high as 40 million degrees.
off course, unless you mean nuclear fission is which breaking apart larger molecules into smaller molecules and releasing energy that way, but it does not have hydrogen forming into helium, which is a characteristic in the nuclear fusion reactor, which will theoretically work. so far they have made trial runs at a few universities and it generated electricity. but considerably less then it took to run the massive electro-magnets that control the extremely hot and yet polar molecules. basically the large electromagnets push the extremely hot hydrogen away from the surface and that way prevent it from melting the core.
from your description you have the nuclear fusion and the nuclear fission now that i read it again. nuclear fusion is combining two molecules into one, and nuclear fission is breaking apart the molecules. i do not know if it will work though. generally as two molecules get close together it will try harder to get away, and that is the reason it is just so freaking hard, i mean it takes massive temperatures comparable to the sun or actually on earth hotter then the sun because we need to make up for the pressure advantage the sun has over the nuclear fusion as a process of making it happen by making the reaction temperature much higher and stuff..
Why dont they build a fusion powered rocket. They could build small pellets out of Hf178 that has been pumped to a higher energy state. The pellets would be hollow and be filled with deturium and tritium. It would be encased in U238 with holes milled in it. The pellets could be shot into a chamber then a high powered x-ray laser would be shot through the holes in the casing and on the Hf178. The Hf178 would go back to its normal energy level and release gamma rays. The gamma rays would compress the hydrogen and make it fuse into helium releasing a few neutrons. The heat would vaporize the hafnium and uranium casing and the helium left over could act to as a moderator to slow down the neutrons. The chamber would be sealed off and cooled with liquid hydrogen. Then the hydrogen would flow through a series of hollow plates in the reactor and the extremely hot hydrogen acts as the propellant. The reactor itself could be made of tungsten. The reactor would have small holes milled in it to let the products of the reaction escape. It wold be fired in space only but could be put in space by building a thermal nuclear rocket engine into it.
