Characterization of a coaxial ECR plasma thruster

Jarrige, Julien; Elias, Paul-Quentin; Packan, Denis; Cannat, F.

doi:10.2514/6.2013-2628

Cited by 25 publications

(45 citation statements)

References 7 publications

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“…11 The VASIMR 12,13 uses a helicon source to produce the plasma, an Ion Cyclotron Resonance stage to heat it, and a MN to finally accelerate the hot plasma beam. A last example is the ECR (Electron Cyclotron Resonance) plasma thruster, 14 which combines the use of an ECR plasma source and a MN.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Electron cooling and finite potential drop in a magnetized plasma expansion

2015

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The steady, collisionless, slender flow of a magnetized plasma into a surrounding vacuum is considered. The ion component is modeled as mono-energetic, while electrons are assumed Maxwellian upstream. The magnetic field has a convergent-divergent geometry, and attention is restricted to its paraxial region, so that 2D and drift effects are ignored. By using the conservation of energy and magnetic moment of particles and the quasi-neutrality condition, the ambipolar electric field and the distribution functions of both species are calculated self-consistently, paying attention to the existence of effective potential barriers associated to magnetic mirroring. The solution is used to find the total potential drop for a set of upstream conditions, plus the axial evolution of various moments of interest (density, temperatures, and heat fluxes). The results illuminate the behavior of magnetic nozzles, plasma jets, and other configurations of interest, showing, in particular, in the divergent plasma the collisionless cooling of electrons, and the generation of collisionless electron heat fluxes. V C 2015 AIP Publishing LLC.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Electron cooling and finite potential drop in a magnetized plasma expansion

2015

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“…From the inception of the magnetic nozzle 1 (MN), there has been a growing interest in their capability to accelerate a plasma "contactlessly" in advanced electric propulsion. Examples of next-generation plasma thrusters based on MNs that are actively being developed include the Helicon Plasma Thruster 2,3 (HPT), the Electron-Cyclotron-Resonance thruster 4,5 (ECRT), the Applied-field MPD thruster 6 (AF-MPDT), and the Variable Specific Impulse Rocket (VASIMR). 7 In the usual design, a MN consists in an axisymmetric, divergent magnetic field that guides the supersonic expansion of a hot plasma jet.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fully magnetized plasma flow in a magnetic nozzle

Merino

Ahedo

2016

Physics of Plasmas

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A model of the expansion of a plasma in a magnetic nozzle in the full magnetization limit is presented. The fully magnetized and the unmagnetized-ions limits are compared, recovering the whole range of variability in plasma properties, thrust, and plume efficiency, and revealing the differences in the physics of the two cases. The fully magnetized model is the natural limit of the general, 2D, two-fluid model of Ahedo and Merino [Phys. Plasmas 17, 073501 (2010)], and it is proposed as an analytical, conservative estimator of the propulsive figures of merit of partially magnetized plasma expansions in the near region of the magnetic nozzle. V

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“…The thrust can be estimated from the angular profile of the ion current density and from the mean ion velocity i v at centerline (assuming that the velocity is uniform over the angular profile, which has been shown in [13]). Both measurements are performed with a gridded Faraday probe that is described in [12].…”

Section: G Electrostatic Diagnosticsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The principle of the ECR plasma thruster is described in detail in [11] and [13]. The thruster consists of a 27 mm diameter and 15 mm long semi-open coaxial plasma source ( Fig.…”

Section: A Description Of the Thruster Technology And Prototypesmentioning

confidence: 99%