On Saturday 12th October 2019 several people met at a special symposium designed to accelerate Project Icarus. It was titled ‘Project Icarus Concept Design Fusion Ignition Physics and Engineering Propulsion Workshop’. Presenting at this meeting was Kelvin F Long, Rob Swinney and Richard Osborne,
This was a workshop focussed on the fusion physics issues relevant to Project Icarus. This is a theoretical design study launched in 2009 to re-design the Project Daedalus spacecraft. The project is nearing completion but there are some issues on closing out the design concept for the Starship Resolution and Starship Endeavour concepts and the purpose of this workshop was to help bring that work to a close so that the project can be published and completed. The focus of this meeting was on the fusion ignition system and also the power, thermal management and fuel storage/acquisition so it was a propulsion specific meting and the team not discus other issues such as communications, science instruments or the payload other than from a top level. Several external people had also been invited to add additional input to the discussions focussed around fusion propulsion designs. The meeting was chaired by Rob Swinney who is the Project Leader for Project Icarus. This was a working level meeting to facilitate discussions on the physics and engineering issues.
Rob Swinney welcomed everyone to the meeting and outlined the purpose for the day. Kelvin F Long presented the Project Daedalus study and some of the physics and engineering issues that had been highlighted by the wider team. Rob Swinney then presented all of the different vehicle concepts that several sub-teams had conceived at a concept level. Richard Osborne presented some of his thinking on the power systems for the Project Icarus vehicle and how they differed from Daedalus. The meeting was then dominated by Kelvin going through his Fortran 95 coding of the different vehicle designs and what work was required to increase its modelling capacity to include the fusion capsule design in particular.
It was agreed that the two main issues that needed to be addressed was the high neutron flux and x-ray radiation environment produced from the energetic capsules. Although it was planned to include an insulation layer in the engine bell and also radiator fins external to the thrust chambers, Kelvin argued that the specific design that he was proposing, based on the principle of shock ignition designs, would actually help to moderate the excess release of offending energies anyway. In particular, the adoption of a thick ablator shell would moderate some of the energy release.
The formal workshop was followed by an extensive discussion between the participants and actual design calculations to make progress and discuss the results. This was then followed by a special virtual meeting with designer Robert Freeland in the United States to garner his feedback on the progress made. Further discussions were to be continued in the coming weeks.
References:
R. M. Freeland, Project Icarus, Firefly Icarus: An Unmanned Interstellar Probe Utilizing Z-Pinch Propulsion, Internal Project Icarus report, October 2013.
A. Hein et al., Project Icarus, TUM Ghost Team Design, Internal Project Icarus report, October 2013.
K. F. Long, R. Osborne, P. Galea, Project Icarus Starship Resolution Sub-Team Concept Design Report, Internal Project Icarus report, October 2013.
M. Stanic, Project Icarus Ultra-Dense Deuterium Based Vehicle Concept, Internal Project Icarus report, December 2013.