[FPSPACE] Priorities in Space Science Enabled by Nuclear Power and Propulsion

[LARRY KLAES]

Priorities in Space Science Enabled by Nuclear Power and Propulsion

Committee on Priorities for Space Science Enabled by Nuclear Power and 
Propulsion, National Research Council

158 pages, 8 1/2 x 11, 2006

In 2003, NASA began an R&D effort to develop nuclear power and propulsion 
systems for solar system exploration. This activity, renamed Project 
Prometheus in 2004, was initiated because of the inherent limitations in 
photovoltaic and chemical propulsion systems in reaching many solar system 
objectives. To help determine appropriate missions for a nuclear power and 
propulsion capability, NASA asked the NRC for an independent assessment of 
potentially highly meritorious missions that may be enabled if space nuclear 
systems became operational.

This report provides a series of space science objectives and missions that 
could be so enabled in the period beyond 2015 in the areas of astronomy and 
astrophysics, solar system exploration, and solar and space physics. It is 
based on but does not reprioritize the findings of previous NRC decadal 
surveys in those three areas.

http://www.nap.edu/catalog/11432.html