Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cornell!rochester!dietz
From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Solid State Fusion for Launchers
Message-ID: <1989Mar31.163051.5961@cs.rochester.edu>
Date: 31 Mar 89 21:30:50 GMT
Reply-To: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Organization: U of Rochester, CS Dept, Rochester, NY
Lines: 22

The apparent absence of major neutron emission and hot waste from the
solid state fusion discovery raises the possibility of resurrecting
nuclear rockets for launchers.

I see two possibilities.  The first is to use heat from a solid state
fusion reactor to heat hydrogen, NERVA style.  This would require that
the power density be a couple of orders of magnitude higher than that
claimed by Pons & Fleischmann.  For on-orbit use the power density
need not be as high.

The second possibility is to use a smaller fusion reactor to preheat
fuel and/or oxidizer before injection into a conventional chemical
engine.  This would increase the Isp beyond that possible with
chemical fuels alone.

For use in launchers, we'd want a fusion reactor that (1) can be shut
down in seconds, (2) has high power density, and (3) operates at high
temperature.  (3) might mean we want a material with a higher melting
point than palladium (hafnium, maybe?).

	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu