Oak Ridge Today

Y-12 reactor core could be used for power on Moon, Mars

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

NASA fission power system concept (Image credit: NASA Glenn Research Center)

NASA fission power system concept (Image credit: NASA Glenn Research Center)

 

A reactor core that includes highly enriched uranium alloy components produced at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge could power future space exploration, including on the Moon and Mars, federal officials said.

The reactor core fabricated at Y-12 has been delivered to the Nevada National Security Site, where it is being used in a experiment called Kilopower. That’s a new power source that could provide safe, efficient energy for future robotic and human space exploration missions, according to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA. The power source could help provide lighting, water, and oxygen on those missions.

NASA said the pioneering space power system, which would use nuclear fission, could provide up to 10 kilowatts of continuous electrical power for at least 10 years. That’s enough power to run two average households.

Four Kilopower units would provide enough power to establish an outpost, NASA said. The system could enable long-term stays on planetary surfaces.

Testing, which started in November, is being performed through this spring at the National Critical Experiments Research Center in the Device Assembly Facility at the Nevada National Security Site. [Read more…]

Roane State professor to discuss his Pluto flyby involvement

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Ted Stryk, ORICL lecturer

Ted Stryk

In July 2015, the world learned about the flyby of Pluto and its moons by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft.

Ted Stryk, associate professor of philosophy and English at Roane State Community College, is participating in the geology and geophysics investigation of Pluto and its moons for the New Horizons team.

He will discuss the latest findings and the story behind his involvement in probing the dwarf planet and its satellites as the next presenter in the Roane State–Oak Ridge Institute for Continued Learning Intergenerational Lecture Series. The lecture is free and open to the public.

Stryk will deliver his talk at 3 p.m. Wednesday, April 27, in the City Room, A-111, in the Coffey-McNally Building at Roane State Community College’s Oak Ridge Branch Campus on Briarcliff Avenue.

“The Pluto flyby occurred 50 years to the day after the first planet, Mars, was imaged close up by Mariner 4,” Stryk said. “The flyby marks the completion of the initial reconnaissance of our solar system as we saw it on the eve of the space age. [Read more…]

Plutonium-238 produced at ORNL helps restores ability to power NASA space missions

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

ORNL-Plutonium-238

By producing 50 grams of plutonium-238, Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers have demonstrated the nation’s ability to provide a valuable energy source for deep space missions. (Photo by ORNL)

 

With the production of 50 grams of plutonium-238, researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory have restored a U.S. capability dormant for nearly 30 years and set the course to provide power for NASA and other missions.

Plutonium-238 produces heat as it decays, and it can be used in systems that power spacecraft instruments. The new sample, which is in the same oxide powder form used to manufacture heat sources for power systems, represents the first end-to-end demonstration of a plutonium-238 production capability in the United States since the Savannah River Plant in South Carolina ceased production of the material in the late 1980s.

Researchers will analyze the sample for chemical purity and plutonium-238 content, then verify production efficiency models and determine whether adjustments need to be made before scaling up the process.

“Once we automate and scale up the process, the nation will have a long-range capability to produce radioisotope power systems such as those used by NASA for deep space exploration,” said Bob Wham, who leads the project for the lab’s Nuclear Security and Isotope Technology Division. [Read more…]

Professor lectures on asteroid spacecraft Wednesday in Oak Ridge

Posted at
By 3 Comments

Harry “Hap” McSween, a professor of planetary geoscience at the University of Tennessee, will discuss discoveries made by the Dawn spacecraft orbiting Vesta, the second most massive asteroid, during a Wednesday lecture in Oak Ridge.

McSween is a geologist and distinguished professor who has served as head of UT’s Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences and as former interim dean of the College of Arts and Sciences.

[Read more…]