Preliminary Analysis on Key Technologies of Gridded Helicon Ion Thrusters

Helicon wave,excited by helicon antenna,could produce high density,low temperature plasma with low RF power and weak axial magnetic field.The acceleration mechanisms of helicon plasma thrusters that have been designed are dominantly electrodeless including double layer,magnetic nozzle etc.,while the thrust,specific impulse and efficiency are incomparable with existing electric propulsion thrusters.An appealing thruster is the gridded helicon ion thruster(GHIT),which combines the high efficient helicon plasma source with mature gridded ion extraction,and can be a new high efficiency,long life and high specific impulse thruster.This paper analyzed the key technologies to design a GHIT and improve its performance,and gave some suggestions for GHIT design.