Experimental investigation on the plasma morphology of ablative pulsed plasma thruster with tongue-shaped and flared electrodes

Wu, Jianjun; Zhang, Yu; Ou, Yang; Zhang, Hua

doi:10.1088/2058-6272/ab9171

Cited by 5 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 19 publications

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“…The electric propulsion system has several advantages such as high specific impulse, long lifetime, repeatable start, low thrust, and high control accuracy. It can significantly increase the payload of spacecraft, extend their service life, and reduce their launch costs, it is therefore widely employed in microsatellites [1][2][3][4][5]. Regarding electric propulsion systems, the pulsed plasma thruster (PPT) is considered suitable for microsatellites owing to its simple structure, low cost, high specific impulse at low power and precise thrust.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Characteristics of plasma in a novel laser-assisted pulsed plasma thruster

Zhao¹,

Wu²,

Ou³

et al. 2022

Plasma Sci. Technol.

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A novel laser-assisted pulsed plasma thruster (LA-PPT) is proposed as an electric propulsion thruster, which separates laser ablation and electromagnetic acceleration. It aims for a higher specific impulse than that achieved with conventional LA-PPTs. Owing to the short-time discharge and the novel configuration, the physical mechanism of the discharge is unclear. Time and spatial-resolved optical emission spectroscopy was applied to investigate the variation in the plasma properties in the thruster discharge channel. The plasma species, electron temperature, and electron density were obtained and discussed. Our investigation revealed that there were H α , H β , H γ , H ε atoms, C I, C II, C III, C IV, Cl I, Cl II particles, and a small amount of CH, C3, C2, H2 neutral molecular groups in the plasma. The electron temperature of the discharge channel of the thruster was within 0.6–4.9 eV, and the electron density was within (1.1–3.0) × 1018 cm−3, which shows that the optical emission spectroscopy method is to measure the electron excitation temperature and electron density in heavy particles. But the Langmuir probe method is to measure the temperature and density of free electrons. The use of laser instead of spark plug as the ignition mode significantly changed the plasma distribution in the discharge channel. Unlike the conventional PPT, which has high electron density near the thruster surface, LA-PPT showed relatively large electron density at the thruster outlet, which increased the thruster specific impulse. In addition, the change in the ignition mode enabled the electron density in the LA-PPT discharge channel to be higher than that in the conventional PPT. This proves that the ignition mode with laser replacing the spark plug effectively optimised the PPT performance.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Characteristics of plasma in a novel laser-assisted pulsed plasma thruster

Zhao¹,

Wu²,

Ou³

et al. 2022

Plasma Sci. Technol.

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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Side and front fast imaging of solid and liquid fed ablative pulsed plasma thruster’s discharge

Riazantsev,

Jakubczak,

Cichorek

et al. 2024

Acta Astronautica

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A predictive model for macro-performances applied to laser-assisted pulsed plasma thrusters

Zhang

et al. 2022

Physics of Plasmas

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The laser-assisted pulsed plasma thruster is considered a promising propulsion system to support the tasks of microsatellites because of its high specific impulse and low volume. Different from the traditional pulsed plasma thruster, laser-assisted pulsed plasma thruster uses the laser to replace the spark plug for ignition, which can avoid ignition failure and remove the side effect of carbon deposition. Both the thrust efficiency and impulse bit are expected to increase after the plasma flow produced by laser ablation is further ionized and accelerated. Since there are a few macro-performance prediction models in laser-assisted pulsed plasma thrusters, this paper develops a model based on the laser ablation model and electromagnetic acceleration model to capture macro-performances of laser-assisted pulsed plasma thrusters. In this model, the initial velocity and mass of plasma flow can be obtained from the ablation model, and the acceleration model is utilized to describe the electromagnetic acceleration process of plasma flow. With this combined model, the discharge current, voltage, impulse bit, specific impulse, and thrust efficiency can be estimated. The deviation between the predicted results and experimental results was less than 10%, verifying the correctness of the developed model. The effects of different parameters on the performance are further investigated with this model.

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Experimental investigation on the plasma morphology of ablative pulsed plasma thruster with tongue-shaped and flared electrodes

Cited by 5 publications

References 19 publications

Characteristics of plasma in a novel laser-assisted pulsed plasma thruster

Characteristics of plasma in a novel laser-assisted pulsed plasma thruster

Side and front fast imaging of solid and liquid fed ablative pulsed plasma thruster’s discharge

A predictive model for macro-performances applied to laser-assisted pulsed plasma thrusters

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