Nuclear Fusion Powered Rocket To Take Humans To Mars

If you aim to travel to the distant red planet 'Mars' and have began saving for your trip; please be aware that the return journey takes about 4 years and overall cost of your trip would be $12 billion approximately, with the latest technology available. If that shatters your dreams, then the research engineers at the University of Washington have a good news for you - they're already working on a new rocket that uses nuclear fusion to power itself and cut down the duration from 4 years to approximately 30 - 90 days. In addition, the trip would be safer, more economical and of course practical.


The research team has demonstrated successful laboratory tests of all the individual processes that'd be involved in the project. The key now, is to demonstrate that each of these successful processes can be synched to realise the 'man on Mars' dream. The team has developed a new type of plasma that is surrounded by its own magnetic field. When the plasma is compressed to very high pressure with the help of magnetic fields, nuclear fusions occurs. A small grain of sand of this material would provide the same amount of energy as 1 gallon of rocket fuel.

Nuclear fusion might cause concerns because it's always associated with nuclear bombs. The team says that the rocket would power-down the energy by a factor of 1 billion as compared to the hydrogen bomb. It would provide the rocket just enough energy to break out of Earth's gravitational force and complete its journey to Mars. Check following video that demonstrates the fusion driven rocket -