Pulse Detonation Engine - Popular Culture

Popular Culture

• In the sci-fi novel Aelita (1923), two Russians travel to Mars in a pulse detonation rocket utilizing "a fine powder of unusual explosive force" (p. 19).
• In the drama television series JAG, the Season Nine episode "The One That Got Away" (original air date October 17, 2003) features the Aurora — which in the show is a super-secret hypersonic aircraft under development by the CIA that uses a pulse-detonation engine.
• In the movie Stealth (2005), the advanced fighters use pulse-detonation engines with scramjet boosters.
• The PDE has been used as a story point in a number of modern novels such as Dan Brown's thriller, Deception Point (the second page of the book states that all technologies in the story are non-fictional and exist, albeit without referencing any sources), and Victor Koman's science fiction polemic, Kings of the High Frontier.
• In X-COM (UFO: Enemy unknown), the Interceptor is equipped with a two pulse detonation engines, capable of sustained flight speed of 2100 knots, minimal speed of about 1000 knots. However even this huge propulsion force is inferior compared to the alien Gravity Wave Engines.
• In the SyFy television series, Eureka, season 4 episode 10 features a flying sleigh described as being powered by a PDE.