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takyon writes:

New breed of rocket fuel is greener and safer

Scientists at McGill University in Montreal have created a new type of solid rocket fuel that they say is safer and cleaner than existing high-energy aerospace fuels.

Rocket fuels typically need to be hypergolic, combusting instantly when they come into contact with an external oxidizer. Most of the fuels used today are derived from hydrazine, a highly toxic and unstable compound of hydrogen and nitrogen that must be handled with inordinate care. Despite this, it's estimated that around 12,000 tons of carcinogenic hydrazine-based fuels are released into the atmosphere each year by the aerospace industry.

Described in Science Advances [open, DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aav9044] [DX], the McGill rocket fuel is based on zeolitic imidazolate frameworks (ZIFs), a type of metal organic framework (MOF) where metal ions are clustered together with an organic molecule called a linker. According to the researchers, the high latent energy of these MOFs can be unlocked using simple chemical triggers, producing a rapid hypergolic response and ignition within 2 milliseconds.

"This is a new, cleaner approach to making highly combustible fuels, that are not only significantly safer than those currently in use, but they also respond or combust very quickly, which is an essential quality in rocket fuel," said co-senior author Tomislav Friščic, a professor in McGill's Chemistry Department.

Also at Silicon Republic.

Original Submission