Luke Andersen joined leading experts at the STAR☆FIRE 2025 Summer Workshop hosted by Idaho National Laboratory (INL).

Over two packed days, the event brought together NASA, DOE labs, industry, and students to advance space nuclear fission for propulsion and power.

Key Highlights:

• INL’s cutting-edge space reactor R&D (Jess Gehin)
• History of space nuclear power, including Rover/NERVA (Chris Stanek, LANL)
• Lessons from Kilopower/KRUSTY and past NASA programs (Lee Mason, Theresa Cutler)
• HALEU vs. HEU design challenges (Jeff King)
• Nuclear thermal propulsion fuel and thermal modeling (BWXT, UTSA)
• Radiation shielding for space reactors (Alex Levinsky, LANL)
• Dark Fission’s three-step orbital demo plan (Fred Kennedy)
• NCERC criticality research overview (Cole Kostelac)