Particle-in-cell simulation of a Hall thruster

Liu, Hui; Wu, Boying; Yu, Daren; Cao, Yong; Duan, Ping

doi:10.1088/0022-3727/43/16/165202

Cited by 72 publications

(43 citation statements)

References 18 publications

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“…Therefore, the PIC method is chosen in this article to carry out the simulations. Our team has already established and validated a 2D PIC model that is able to simulate the macro‐discharge process of a Hall thruster and reported some contributions …”

Section: Pic Numerical Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Particle‐in‐cell simulation of the effect of curved magnetic field on wall bombardment and erosion in a hall thruster

Liu

Hu³

et al. 2019

Contributions to Plasma Physics

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A curved, convex towards the channel bottom magnetic field is an important feature of an advanced Hall thruster that allows confining the plasma flow in the channel center, reducing the divergence angle of the ejected ion beam, and improving the discharge performance. In this article, the discharge behaviour of a Hall thruster in magnetic fields with different degrees of curvature is simulated with a particle‐in‐cell numerical method, and the effect of curved magnetic field on the ion bombardment and wall erosion and the associated mechanisms are studied and analysed. The results show that, as the curvature of the magnetic field increases, the propellant ionization becomes more confined at the channel center, the potential drop inside the channel decreases, and the acceleration region shifts outside the channel, which lead to the attenuation of the ion energy bombarding the wall and the deviation of the bombardment angle from the optimal sputtering angle. Conversely, the ion flux bombarding the wall near the channel exit increases. Nevertheless, the bombardment energy and angle are the dominant factors for the wall erosion, and the wall erosion rate clearly decreases with the increasing curvature of the magnetic field. These findings are closely related to the behaviour of electron conduction under a curved magnetic field; the relevant mechanisms are clarified in this article.

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Section: Pic Numerical Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Particle‐in‐cell simulation of the effect of curved magnetic field on wall bombardment and erosion in a hall thruster

Liu

Hu³

et al. 2019

Contributions to Plasma Physics

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“…The plasma plume is assumed to be quasi-neutrality [22], isothermal, un-magnetized and collisionless flow. The effect of magnetic field on Hall thruster plume has been researched in [23]. However, the magnetic field leakage of LIPS-200 type ion thruster is much smaller than that in the Hall thruster according to its configuration.…”

Section: Particle Movementmentioning

confidence: 99%

Three-dimensional particle simulation of ion thruster plume flows with EX-PWS

Zheng

Cai

Wang³

2018

Plasma Sci. Technol.

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Ion thruster plumes from a multi-thruster array of different working configurations are simulated by a hybrid fluid-particle software. The particle in cell method is employed to model the transports of ions. The direct simulation Monte Carlo method is used to model momentum and charge exchange (CEX) collisions. The software is based on unstructured grids which make it easy to handle with complex geometry. The results of chamber simulation are compared with experimental data in ion current density and number density, which show good agreements. The maximum difference of current density along the thruster centerline is less than 9.30%. The interaction effects of plumes when multiple thrusters are operating in vacuum are predicted. Distributions of single charged xenon ions are significantly different in the near-field plume flow, however, merge into one in the far downstream region. Moreover, the interaction effect on the spatial distribution of CEX xenon ions is displayed as well.

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“…The 2D-3V particle-in-cell (PIC) and Monte Carlo collisions (MCC) model we developed employs the particle in cell method combined with the Monte Carlo method to simulate the neutral gas, electrons and ions, including their positions, speeds and energies. This model has been used to study double-stage Hall thrusters, magnetic mirror effects and electron near-wall transport (Hofer et al 2006;Yu et al 2009Yu et al , 2012aLi et al 2010;Li, Ning & Yu 2013;Liu et al 2010Liu et al , 2015.…”

Section: General Description Of the Particle In Cell Modelmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of the magnetic field gradient on the wall power deposition of Hall thrusters

Ding

Zhang

et al. 2017

J. Plasma Phys.

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The effect of the magnetic field gradient in the discharge channel of a Hall thruster on the ionization of the neutral gas and power deposition on the wall is studied through adopting the 2D-3V particle-in-cell (PIC) and Monte Carlo collisions (MCC) model. The research shows that by gradually increasing the magnetic field gradient while keeping the maximum magnetic intensity at the channel exit and the anode position unchanged, the ionization region moves towards the channel exit and then a second ionization region appears near the anode region. Meanwhile, power deposition on the walls decreases initially and then increases. To avoid power deposition on the walls produced by electrons and ions which are ionized in the second ionization region, the anode position is moved towards the channel exit as the magnetic field gradient is increased; when the anode position remains at the zero magnetic field position, power deposition on the walls decreases, which can effectively reduce the temperature and thermal load of the discharge channel.

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Particle-in-cell simulation of a Hall thruster

Cited by 72 publications

References 18 publications

Particle‐in‐cell simulation of the effect of curved magnetic field on wall bombardment and erosion in a hall thruster

Particle‐in‐cell simulation of the effect of curved magnetic field on wall bombardment and erosion in a hall thruster

Three-dimensional particle simulation of ion thruster plume flows with EX-PWS

Effects of the magnetic field gradient on the wall power deposition of Hall thrusters

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