One of the great challenges of space exploration is finding a cheap, abundant and efficient fuel that powers spacecraft on trips into space where there is no possibility of refueling. What better for that than water, the most common element on Earth?
The Cornell University (USA) team that participates in the Cube Quest Challenge , a contest organized by NASA that offers five million dollars to those who successfully design, build and launch a small satellite, works under this premise. (a CubeSat, as they are called) capable of reaching the Moon (or beyond) and working in its orbit.
The winning vehicle of the competition will be launched by NASA in early 2018.
Good and cheap
The ship is not quite the Star Wars thing to do, as you can see, but it promises maximum efficiency. The Cislunar Explorers (that’s what the Cornell University team calls their 1.3-kilogram vehicles) aim to reduce the costs and complexity of space exploration.
How do they work? They take advantage of solar energy to electrolyze the water in their tanks and decompose it into hydrogen and oxygen, gases that propel the vehicle through a periodic combustion process that is repeated without depleting the water.
Cislunar Explorers are made up of two L-shaped modules that will gradually separate as they travel to the Moon, to stay within a few kilometers of each other as they enter the satellite’s orbit. The water tanks are located in the lower part of the line, and the ships complete their equipment with cameras that will locate the Earth, the Sun and the Moon and allow the position of the device to be calculated by triangulation.
Mason Peck, a former NASA fellow, a specialist in mechanical and aerospace engineering and team leader at Cornell University, argues that this new form of propulsion will change space travel: “It will allow us to go further and probably faster, and recharge. fuel ships in the middle of their journey without depending on supplies from Earth. “
Image: Cislunar Explorers
