NASA Trials Groundbreaking Liquid-Lithium Engine for Mars Mission
TL;DR
NASA completed high-power tests of a liquid-lithium, magnetoplasmadynamic thruster at up to 120 kilowatts, a major step toward crewed Mars propulsion. Lithium promises higher exhaust velocities and reduced propellant mass versus xenon, but handling molten lithium and corrosion pose severe engineering challenges. Next steps include thousands of hours of endurance testing and scaling toward megawatt-class power (2–4 MW) for long-duration deep-space missions.
Topics:technologyspace#electric-propulsion#lithium-propulsion#mars-mission#nasa-jpl#plasma-thruster#space
- NASA Accelerates Toward Mars With a More Powerful Engine Than Anything It Has Tested Before Indian Defence Review
- NASA Fires Up Powerful Lithium-Fed Thruster for Trips to Mars NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) (.gov)
- New lithium-plasma engine passes key Mars propulsion test Phys.org
- NASA Fires Up Futuristic Plasma Thruster Designed to Take Us to Mars Futurism
- NASA’s Lithium-Fed Nuclear Thruster Flares to Life in First of Its Kind Test Gizmodo
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