Reaching Alpha Centauri within a single human lifetime has long sounded like science fiction, yet a new generation of nuclear ...

Nuclear pulse propulsion is a technology that would work. It was being developed in the 1960s but it was stopped because of the nuclear test ban treaty and concerns over fallout inside the ...

From 1958 to 1965, the U.S. government sponsored the Orion program, which developed the idea of nuclear pulse propulsion. This concept was to power spacecraft by dropping nuclear bombs and using the ...

If we achieve advanced nuclear, antimatter propulsion or other advance propulsion it would be possible to achieve near constant acceleration. This would enable travel times to Mars in the 3-8 day ...

On Episode 152 of This Week In Space, Rod Pyle and Tariq Malik host Dr. Robert O'Brien, Director of the Universities Space Research Association's Center for Space Nuclear Research, for a fascinating ...

NASA plans to send crewed missions to Mars over the next decade – but the 140 million-mile (225 million-kilometer) journey to the red planet could take several months to years round trip. This ...

Scientists and engineers are diligently working on innovative concepts to make the next era of human spaceflight more powerful and more efficient using nuclear propulsion. One of these designs, known ...

Every year, companies and space agencies launch hundreds of rockets into space—and that number is set to grow dramatically with ambitious missions to the moon, Mars and beyond. But these dreams hinge ...

A consortium led by Belgian engineering firm Tractebel has completed the European Space Agency-commissioned RocketRoll project on nuclear electric propulsion for space exploration. The consortium has ...

A study commissioned by the American Bureau of Shipping has explored the potential of advanced nuclear reactor technology for commercial marine propulsion, whilst a study led by UK-based innovative ...

(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.) (THE CONVERSATION) Every year, companies and space agencies launch hundreds of rockets ...