Fusion drives are not so Sci-Fi any longer

Princenton university has been working on something pretty cool

"Scientists from Princeton Satellite Systems are working on a new concept called Direct Fusion Drive (DFD) that is based on the PFRC. It would produce electric power and propulsion from a single compact fusion reactor. The first concept study and modeling (Phase I) was published in 2017, and was proposed to power the propulsion system of a Pluto orbiter and lander. Adding propellant to the cool plasma flow results in a variable thrust when channeled through a magnetic nozzle. Modeling suggests that the DFD might produce 5 Newtons of thrust per each MW of generated fusion power. Approximately 35% of the fusion power goes to thrust, 30% to electric power, 25% lost to heat, and 10% is recirculated for the RF heating. The concept has advanced to Phase II to further advance the design and shielding. "

Its basically a tokamak… but the field is instead reversed and used to propel and produce a little electricity…

dont care if become donkey balls for the US government
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I definitely want to see these methods of propulsion take off. Rockets are old school!

Let’s discuss below

the light given off is beautiful
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Any idea whats this propellant?

Deuterium from what ive read

Yup seems to give same color

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Thought doing that with blender, and it doesnt seem to give off any red light, its just green and blue
https://refractiveindex.info/?shelf=main&book=D2&page=Weber

The color isn’t quite from the elements. Im not so sure the element matters. Its the energy levels of the atoms in general. When their electrons jump to higher orbitals at stupid high levels purple in theory is the one of the highest energy colors we can see.

The sun releases white light mainly because fusion occurs in the core and is largely wasteful. Energy has to be wasted getting the released light and heat to the surface. The reason why the magnetic radiation is so strong is because like earths core… The fluid is in motion and that convection and coriolis is exactly what creates our magnetic field.

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65% efficiency isn’t bad, less energy efficient than LH2/LOX rockets, but you get the advantage of your fuel packing a ton of energy for its mass, so you don’t need to worry about pushing all that LH2 and its oxidizer around.

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What is the specific impulse of these drives?

That’s actually a good question a lot of its research I may have to grab some IEEE documentation

That’s the goddamn power stone!

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Do they work without atmosphere?

yes? they are supplied by a fuel that you carry onboard vs extracting it from the atmosphere from what ive read

the other question is as to the thrust-specific fuel consumption

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assuming the thrust to fuel mass is good, these could be great for long distance space travel.

it’s not rocket science :^)

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We will have to do more digging… start looking at their research publications

They are being too quiet about it right now

It only works in space. Is basically an ion thruster with 5-10 newtons per MW. The amount of electricity it can produce is pretty exciting for powering equipment on board. Could lead to some very powerful sensors and onboard processing.

Steaming back raw data from pluto for example is super slow. If the satellite could do the work there and send back results. It could do a lot more work overs its lifetime.

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I imagine we’ll still want the raw data as our technology would have advanced greatly in the decades it would take to get to pluto, but with a ton of electricity available it could transmit a much higher bandwidth signal without need for so much retransmission.

That electricity must come from otherwise wasted heat, anyway. Would prefer to redirect most of it towards propulsion.

hell yeah welcome to the forum man!

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Is that meant to be MILLIWATT? Because 5n per MEGAWATT is pretty fucking bad.