as a concept<\/a> for sending a probe into interstellar space, but has yet to make it into orbit. Thornburg, along with co-founders Ian Vorbach and Prashaanth Ravindran, plans to change that in the next two years.<\/p>\nThornburg began his career in the U.S. Air Force, where he worked on a program to develop an efficient, powerful next-generation kind of rocket engine that engineers call full-flow staged combustion. A decade later, he was wooed to SpaceX by Elon Musk to turn those concepts into the Raptor engine that now powers the company\u2019s massive Starship.<\/p>\n
After stints working at Stratolaunch and Amazon\u2019s Project Kuiper, he turned to propulsion once again.<\/p>\n
A new kind of rocket engine<\/p>\n
Solar thermal power is, in Thornburg\u2019s view, the next logical step in rocket tech. NASA had studied the technology extensively in the late nineties and concluded it provide better performance in many cases. It wasn\u2019t developed further because there wasn\u2019t enough demand for in-space mobility, according to a 2003 report commissioned by NASA. <\/p>\n
Techcrunch event<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSan Francisco, CA
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t|
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tOctober 13-15, 2026\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
With satellites and space probes flying much more rarely back then, it was simpler just to use a more powerful rocket than invest in in-space propulsion. Now, with thousands of new satellites flying every year and the U.S. military demanding spacecraft that can fly quickly between orbits to surveil or threaten rivals, that calculus has been turned on its head.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s no longer acceptable to move slowly on orbit,\u201d Thornburg told TechCrunch. \u201cYou know, China\u2019s running circles around our spacecraft. We need equivalent capability.\u201d<\/p>\n
Portal has already received $45 million in strategic funding from the U.S. military, on top of $67.5 million in private capital, thanks to the potential for using its technology for orbital warfare, according to Booz Allen Ventures\u2019 managing director Travis Bales.<\/p>\n
And in a future where we may see millions of satellites in orbit around the Earth providing communications and computing services, satellite operators will need cheaper means of maneuvering spacecraft out of each other\u2019s way, notes Aaron Burnett, the CEO of the aerospace-focused venture fund Mach33. Burnett sees Portal becoming a \u201cspace mobility prime,\u201d providing propulsion to a variety of users.<\/p>\n
The path to orbit<\/p>\n
To get there, the company will need to get its technology working in orbit. Its flight electronics were launched on a shakedown cruise around the planet last week, and another prototype spacecraft is expected to launch in October. The company will demonstrate a working prototype of its engine with the launch of its first SuperNova spacecraft\u2014a \u201cfighter jet for orbit,\u201d per Thornburg\u2014expected in 2027.<\/p>\n
Portal benefits from recent advancements in additive manufacturing and materials science, which have led to the development of the company\u2019s combined solar concentrator and nozzle, the Hex thruster.<\/p>\n
Rocket nerds think that nuclear powered rockets are the next step to unlock transportation throughout the solar system, but the regulatory and legal challenges of building such a system make it beyond a startup\u2019s pay grade. <\/p>\n
But Portal\u2019s engine also gives the company a head start on one version of an atomic rocket, a nuclear thermal propulsion system\u2014essentially replacing the heat of the sun with that of a reactor. When the U.S. government is ready to build it, Thornburg\u2019s team will have already proved out many of the moving parts in orbit.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ll be able to help mature this technology much faster on orbit than we ever will by trying to build a $2 billion ground test facility that\u2019s nuclear safe,\u201d Thornburg said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jeff Thornburg helped turn a government research project into SpaceX\u2019s most powerful rocket engine. Now, he\u2019s trying to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":390046,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[61,60,173013,82,247,2306],"class_list":{"0":"post-390045","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-ie","9":"tag-ireland","10":"tag-portal-space-systems","11":"tag-science","12":"tag-space","13":"tag-spacex"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=390045"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390045\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/390046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=390045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=390045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=390045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}