A micro pulsed plasma thruster (PPT) for the "Dawgstar" spacecraft

Cassady, R. Joseph; Hoskins, W. Andrew; Campbell, Mark; Rayburn, Christopher

doi:10.1109/aero.2000.878359

Cited by 20 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 4 publications

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“…The increasing interest in microsystem technology is related once again to the gain in mass, cost, performance and reliability that this technology could offer and also the compatibility it offers with electronic technology permitting the best integration. Among the propulsion systems under investigation for miniaturization and using microsystem technology or hybrid technology are the cold gas thruster [16], subliming solid thruster [17], solid propellant thruster [18,19], vaporizing liquid thruster or resistojet [20,21], micro ion thruster [22,23], and pulsed plasma thruster [24].…”

Section: Emerging Technology In Micropropulsionexamples Of Some Currementioning

confidence: 99%

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Micropropulsion for Space — A Survey of MEMS-based Micro Thrusters and their Solid Propellant Technology

Rossi

2002

Sensors Update

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In the last two decades, advances in microsystems technology have made micro mechanics mature enough to envisage miniaturization in the space industry. The motivation behind this development is the reductions in mass, satellite costs and launch costs in parallel with an increase in the reliability and flexibility of satellites. A cluster of many small satellites, commanded from a mothership, or totally independent, will, without any doubt, reduce the risk of mission failure and increase mission flexibility. This revolution in the space industry will rely on propulsion system development to ensure the maneuvering and fine positioning of micro and nano satellites (defined as satellites with mass between 20-100 kg and under 20 kg, respectively). This paper is provides a stateof-the-art review of micro thruster technologies for space applications. the intention is to overview the different technical solutions under investigation in the micropropulsion field, to assess their merits and disadvantages and to try to identify the promising ones in relation to future missions needs. First, the principles of propulsion and basic concepts and equations useful in describing and comparing propulsion systems are described. Then, a review micropropulsion needs for space is made and the options and technologies available for propulsion are presented. An outline is given of the technological efforts made in miniaturizing propulsion systems through examples from current research programs and the different micropropulsion technologies are compared. After illustrating the assets of microsystem technology in the micropropulsion field by the detailed presentation of one particular micropropulsion option investigated at LAAS-CNRS, namely solid propellant micro thruster arrays, a short discussion is given of the capability of microsystem technology to serve micropropulsion needs.

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Section: Emerging Technology In Micropropulsionexamples Of Some Currementioning

confidence: 99%

“…The lPPT [24] consists of a bar of Teflon propellant pressed between two electrodes with a spring. The spring ensures that the propellant remains in contact during consumption.…”

Section: Micro Pulsed Plasma Thruster (Lppt)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Micropropulsion for Space — A Survey of MEMS-based Micro Thrusters and their Solid Propellant Technology

Rossi

2002

Sensors Update

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“…Most notably these have occurred in the area of formation flight, with leading-edge projects at the Massachusettes Institute of Technology [9,1,10,11] and the University of Toronto [12,13,14]. The UW also developed a single satellite as part of a larger formation for the ION-F mission [7,8]. The work presented here represents the next steps taken at UW to gain the ability to demonstrate our theoretical work in the same areas [15,16,17,18,19].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…As such, university design teams focused on space engineering are increasingly popular across the world. With many successful missions to-date [1,2,3,4,5,6,7] this trend is likely to continue.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Correction: Development of a Generic Guidance Navigation & Control System for Small Satellites: Application to HuskySat-1

Reynolds

Kaycee

Barzgaran

et al. 2018

2018 AIAA SPACE and Astronautics Forum and Exposition

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This paper presents the development of a generic Guidance, Navigation & Control (GNC) system for small satellites at the University of Washington that serves as a testbed for algorithm development and supports small satellite mission design. Our ultimate aim is to advance the capabilities of autonomous satellite operations by demonstrating advanced on-board control and estimation techniques, though the work is equally applicable to earth-imaging, pointing and technology demonstration missions. The work discusses the development of flight software and requisite sensor, actuator and environmental models needed to validate flight software functionality. The first mission application is the HuskySat-1 mission, undertaken by a student-led group at the University of Washington. Primarily a technology demonstration, HuskySat-1 is a 3U CubeSat equipped with a pulsed plasma thruster and a high-frequency communication antenna, equipped with a 3-axis active attitude control subsystem. We demonstrate through software and hardware-based testing that our system supports both scientific payloads. We outline our approach to algorithm development, verification and validation, and briefly hardware-in-the-loop testing.

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