Demonstration of Negative Fullerene Ion Thruster Combined with Positive Xenon Ion Thruster

Koda, Daiki; Kuninaka, Hitoshi

doi:10.2322/tastj.14.pb_203

Cited by 9 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 10 publications

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“…The thruster offers high discharge consumption at low current conditions, as a significant part of ions recombines in the cavity instead of being extracted by the grids. The lowest discharge consumption value is 1611 W A −1 at 2 W, which is relatively higher than the traditional ECR ion thrusters with similar operation power levels [36]. In magnetic-less environments, the plasmawall interaction is more intensive, increasing ion recombination.…”

Section: Thruster Performancementioning

confidence: 87%

Magnetic confinement less microwave discharge gridded ion thruster

Zeng,

Liu,

Huang

et al. 2023

Plasma Sources Sci. Technol.

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A watt-level microwave discharge is induced without magnetic confinement for a high-precision gridded ion thruster, making use of a coaxial transmission line resonator. The thruster is characterized by performance measurements and plasma diagnosis, and a description of the operating mechanism of this thruster is given in this paper. A Faraday probe and a retarding potential analyzer are employed for the diagnosis. The results show that the plume divergence increases due to the electric field formed between the plume and the ion-induced electron emission cathode. A discharge mode transition is found during the increase of the microwave power, in which the bulk heating mode is converted to the surface heating mode. The magnetic-less microwave discharge gridded ion thruster performs a continuously adjustable thrust range of 5–115 μN and a highest total efficiency of 17.2%. Compared to the common ECR ion thruster, this thruster is free from magneto-static interference on the instruments and the additional magnetic momentum on the spacecraft.

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Section: Thruster Performancementioning

confidence: 87%

Magnetic confinement less microwave discharge gridded ion thruster

Zeng,

Liu,

Huang

et al. 2023

Plasma Sources Sci. Technol.

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“…Several negative fullerene ion sources have been developed using this characteristic. For example, source types in which free electrons attach directly to the neutral fullerenes during their near-grazing scattering from a heated material surface [24], and types in which they attach to the fullerenes in plasma [25]. Though these methods can be used to produce C 60 ions effectively, none of these are ion sources developed in order to produce negative ion beams that are used in the acceleration process at tandem accelerators.…”

Section: Electron Attachment Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Novel Approaches for Intensifying Negative C60 Ion Beams Using Conventional Ion Sources Installed on a Tandem Accelerator

Chiba

Usui

Hirano

et al. 2020

QuBS

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We developed novel methods for producing negative C60 ion beams at the accelerator facility Takasaki Ion Accelerators for Advanced Radiation Application (TIARA) to increase the current intensity of swift C60 ion beams accelerated to the MeV energy region using a tandem accelerator. We produced negative C60 ion beams with an intensity of 1.3 µA, which is several tens of thousands of times greater than the intensity of beams produced using conventional methods based on the Cs sputtering process. These beams were obtained by temporarily adding an ionization function based on electron attachment to an existing ion source that is widely used in tandem accelerators. The high-intensity swift C60 ion beams can be made available relatively easily to institutes that have tandem accelerators and ion sources of the type used at TIARA because there is no need to change existing ion sources or install new ones.

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“…where I sg,e is the impingement current of electrons on SG. Equation ( 8) is usually used to calculate the beam current when the impingement currents on grids are measured [59,60]. The sheath structure depends on the balance between the ion current and electron current [61], since the effective area for collecting ions may differ from that for collecting electrons.…”

Section: Modified CL Law In Ion Opticsmentioning

confidence: 99%

On the space-charge effects in the beam extraction process of ion thrusters: the roles of compensating electrons and changing beam radius

Zhang

et al. 2023

Plasma Sources Sci. Technol.

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Space-charge effects limit the beam-extraction capability of the ion optics and thus hindering the miniaturization and other performance improvements of ion thrusters. This paper numerically studies the space-charge effects in ion optics using hybrid and full particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations and proposes a modified Child-Langmuir (CL) law. As the injected current increases, the parallel-plane electrode system which corresponds to the classical CL law will reach an unstable and oscillatory state, while the ion optics system remains stable because the electrons from the bulk plasma will compensate for the space-charge effects. Furthermore, the radial expansion of ion beam and the loss of ions on the grids can counteract the space-charge effects when the injected current increases. In general, the space-charge effects in ion optics are self-consistently adjusted by the compensating electrons and the variation of the beam radius. Accordingly, we identify a region in ion optics where generally no electrons exist to exclude the influence of electron compensation, and then we modify the CL law of this region by taking into account the effect of the change in the beam radius. We validate the modified CL law and demonstrate its effectiveness in predicting the operating points of the ion optics, such as the perveance-limit point.

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Demonstration of Negative Fullerene Ion Thruster Combined with Positive Xenon Ion Thruster

Cited by 9 publications

References 10 publications

Magnetic confinement less microwave discharge gridded ion thruster

Magnetic confinement less microwave discharge gridded ion thruster

Novel Approaches for Intensifying Negative C60 Ion Beams Using Conventional Ion Sources Installed on a Tandem Accelerator

On the space-charge effects in the beam extraction process of ion thrusters: the roles of compensating electrons and changing beam radius

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