The British Interplanetary Society (BIS) has announced a major new competition which will see participants come up with the best ideas relating to the storage and handling of antihydrogen.

The chemical, can in theory, be used to generate nuclear power for use in space exploration technologies, and points the way to highly energetic propulsion systems, designed to reduce the transit time between solar system objects.

The competition has been sponsored by the Mirror Quark company, led by Alan Bond, a renowned British mechanical and aerospace engineer, and will welcome proposals from engineers, scientists and physicists over the next six months (closing date: 11th June 2021).

The participants who come up with the best new idea for storage, handling or manufacture of antihydrogen will be announced as the winners of the competition in October 2021, with first place being awarded a £3,000 cash prize. Second place will be awarded £1,500. £300 will also be available to the best submission by a member of the Student Technical Working Group (STWG), and a £200 prize will be awarded to the runner up by a member of the STWG.

If antihydrogen can be successfully handled, space exploration engineers will be able to replace the existing thermodynamic process of converting heat into electrical power, which is heavy and inefficient, with a nuclear power generating technology, which would be far more time and cost efficient.