According to foreign media reports, the U.S. Department of Defense has teamed up with NASA to start testing a small nuclear energy system that could potentially be used to sustain human energy on Mars, which is now undergoing testing in the Nevada desert.According to U.S. officials, Full-power testing is scheduled to take place in March this year under NASA's Kilopower project.
The Kilopower project, a project aimed at developing preliminary concepts and technologies for low-cost Mars fission nuclear energy systems, will sustain humanity's long-term stay on Mars and will be one of numerous new technologies in the future of humankind.
Right now, the main task of this project and related tests is to determine if fissile energy sources can become a viable option for Mars missions, if not for them to move elsewhere.
Whatever the final energy system, the long-term space mission of the future must be light enough, small enough and energetic enough.
Steve Jurczyk, NASA's Space Technology Task Force, points out that the small size of the energy system means that in the future it would take just one lander to transport multiple units to Mars, and the current prototype is a uranium-25 reactor core, Jurczyk said. The ability to deliver multiple units will provide tens of thousands of kilowatts of power, and as of now, scientists have tested the system for multiple tests and achieved gratifying results.
