There have been full scale nuclear thermal rocket engines built and tested on the ground since the 1960s. The US had the NERVA project. The attraction is that the ISP would be up to triple the ISP of ...

NASA's initiatives to pioneer next-generation space technologies are also hit hard in the White House's budget proposal. If the Trump administration gets its way, NASA's Space Technology Mission ...

NASA and DARPA plan to launch a nuclear-powered spacecraft to Earth orbit in the next few years, to test propulsion technology that could get humanity to Mars.

Engineers say a nuclear thermal rocket could cut astronauts' travel time to Mars from nine months to two. Credit: NASA NASA and the U.S. military plan to test a nuclear-powered rocket engine in ...

A nuclear thermal rocket engine in development could one day transport humans to Mars. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, a research arm of the US Department of Defense, and NASA are ...

Scientists have proposed two experimental spacecraft that could reach one of the farthest known objects in the solar system ...

NASA and DARPA announced a collaboration to demonstrate a working nuclear thermal rocket by 2027 with the goal of sending humans to Mars as quickly as possible.

NASA will test a nuclear-powered rocket for space travel. The technology could speed up a manned trip to Mars from the current seven-month minimum to 45 days.

NASA and DARP will collaborate on a project to develop nuclear thermal rockets that will shorten transit times to Mars, increase load capacity and generate more power.

SpaceX’s Elon Musk and Rocket Lab’s Peter Beck are among the entrepreneurs excited about nuclear-powered rockets, but neither company is developing the technology.

An artist's concept depicts the DRACO spacecraft, which will demonstrate a nuclear thermal rocket engine. Nuclear thermal propulsion technology could be used for future NASA crewed missions to Mars.

There, four different nuclear thermal rocket fuel sample surrogates coated in zirconium carbide were placed in INSET and irradiated for two days under repeated temperature cycling.