What can we learn by studying the exhaust of a plasma thruster?

What is it about?

To understand the physics happening inside a satellite thruster, it is often a good idea to look at its exhaust. Here, we studied the plume of a pulsed plasma thruster with Teflon as a propellant, and found a surprising abundance of highly ionized fluorine (up to F6+) and scarcity of carbon ions. Moreover, by analyzing the shape and composition of the plasma we were able to determine the thruster efficiency.

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Photo by Allison Saeng on Unsplash

Photo by Allison Saeng on Unsplash

Why is it important?

Never before such highly ionized fluorine was found in a pulsed plasma thruster. Moreover, the lack of carbon ions in the plume disrupts most of the theoretical and numerical models which always assumed the presence of both fluorine and carbon in Teflon-like proportions. This is also the first time that data from the plume was successfully used to explain the efficiency of pulsed plasma thruster in terms of propellant utilization, energy utilization and beam divergence. Together, these findings can greatly improve our understanding of these devices and ultimately lead to more efficient means of propulsion for CubeSats.