NASA mulls sending a nuclear-powered Mars rover to the moon

During a news briefing about NASA’s latest moon exploration plans, according to Ars Technica, space agency head Jared Isaacman suggested the possibility of sending a spare nuclear-powered Mars rover — an engineering model of the Mars Perseverance rover — to the moon.

Such a proposal represents outside-the-box thinking for NASA, which is becoming more common under Isaacman’s leadership. Had someone proposed sending a car-sized nuclear rover to the moon in times past, NASA would have gone through its usual years-long, multibillion dollar process to make it happen. By one estimate, Mars Perseverance cost $2.7 billion, including launch costs and initial operations.

The rover in question is an engineering development version of Perseverance, now dubbed Promise, an acronym for Polar Rover for Observation, Mapping, and In-Situ Exploration. It will take some refurbishing to make it able to trundle about the moon instead of Mars, but it likely can be done for far less than the cost of building an entirely new rover of a similar size and capability.

How will the Promise rover land on the moon? Perseverance relied on atmospheric slowing, first with a heat shield and then by parachute. The moon has no atmosphere to speak of. On the other hand, the moon has one-sixth of Earth’s gravity, while Mars has one-third.

Ars Technica suggests that either a SpaceX Starship or a Blue Origin New Glenn will be required to take the Promise rover from Earth to the lunar surface. A Starship Human Landing........

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