Helicon Plasma Thruster: Plasma Propulsion for Satellites
6th September 2020
While traditional chemical propulsion have fundamental upper limits, electric propulsion pumps extra energy into the thrust reaction to reach much higher propellant velocities by accelerating propellant using electrical energy. There are many methods of electric propulsion, many of which require electrodes to apply a current, increasing thruster cost and complexity.
By contrast the Helicon Plasma Thruster uses high power radio frequency waves to excite the propellant into a plasma.