Research of influence of the additional electrode on Hall thruster plume by particle-in-cell simulation*

Abstract

Hall thruster is an electric propulsion device for attitude control and position maintenance of satellites. The discharge process of Hall thruster will produce divergent plume. The plume will cause erosion, static electricity, and other interference to the main components, such as solar sailboard, satellite body, and thruster. Therefore, reducing the divergence of the plume is an important content in the research of thruster plume. The additional electrode to the plume area is a way to reduce the divergence angle of the plume, but there are few related studies. This paper uses the particle-in-cell (PIC) simulation method to simulate the effect of the additional electrode on the discharge of the Hall thruster, and further explains the effect mechanism of the additional electrode on parameters such as the electric field and plume divergence angle. The simulation results show that the existence of the additional electrode can enhance the potential near the additional position. The increase of the potential can effectively suppress the radial diffusion of ions, and effectively reduce the plume divergence angle. The simulation results show that when the additional electrode is 30 V, the half plume divergence angle can be reduced by 18.21%. However, the existence of additional electric electrode can also enhance the ion bombardment on the magnetic pole. The additional electrode is relatively outside, the plume divergence angle is relatively small, and it can avoid excessive ion bombardment on the magnetic pole. The research work of this paper can provide a reference for the beam design of Hall thruster.