Overview
- Asterisk-branded Chakram prototypes completed a test campaign at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center with a 300-second continuous burn and more than 470 seconds total, producing over 4,000 pounds of thrust per engine without visible damage.
- Rotating detonation engines use a supersonic shock wave that circles a ring-shaped chamber to squeeze and ignite propellant more efficiently, which Astrobotic says can boost specific impulse by about 15 percent and improve thrust-to-weight.
- Astrobotic built and tested Chakram with support from two NASA Small Business Innovation Research awards and a Space Act Agreement, leaning on 3D printing to fabricate the annular chamber with a small team and modest funding.
- The company frames near-term uses for the engine on future lunar landers, reusable suborbital vehicles, and orbital transfer tugs, yet it has set no flight date and still needs regenerative cooling, stable throttling, and mass reduction.
- Analysts note most prior RDRE hot fires lasted only seconds, so sustaining 300 seconds signals a shift from lab demos toward engineering-ready systems as rivals such as Venus Aerospace and earlier JAXA efforts advance the field.