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OSTP memo guides space nuclear plan
A White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) memorandum released on Tuesday guides NASA, the Department of Energy, and the Department of Defense on their roles in deploying near-term space nuclear power.
This follows a series of NASA announcements last month—driven by the executive order “Ensuring American Space Superiority,” issued by Trump in December—including an ambitious timeline for establishing a moon base, which would rely on fission surface power (FSP) to survive the long lunar night at the moon’s south pole, and plans for a nuclear electric propulsion (NEP) rocket to be launched in 2028.
S. V. Bogovalov, I. V. Tronin, A. V. Vasilyev
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 199 | Number 1 | January 2025 | Pages 176-183
Research Article | doi.org/10.1080/00295639.2024.2332021
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
In this paper, numerical simulation methods are used to study issues related to the optimal operating modes of hyperspeed (rotor velocity 1000 m/s and above) model gas centrifuges (GCs) of various lengths and velocities of rotation. The possibility of gas extraction under optimal conditions is studied using three-dimensional modeling. It is shown that for hyperspeed GCs with the Pitot tube as gas extractor, simultaneous attainment of the optimal values for both friction power and waste flux, which are necessary for achieving the optimal operating mode, is unattainable, unlike GC models with a rotor velocity of 600 m/s. It is also shown that the working gas within the shockwave generated by the gas extractor can attain temperatures exceeding 1300 K, which raises the question of a possible accelerated decomposition of uranium hexafluoride.