An RF heated tandem mirror plasma propulsion study

Conference · Sun Jan 01 04:00:00 EST 1989

OSTI ID:5572927

Yang, T F; Yao, X; Peng, S; Krueger, W A; Chang-Diaz, F R

Experimental results on a tandem mirror hybrid plume rocket involving a three-stage system of plasma injection, heating, and subsequent injection through a magnetic nozzle are presented. In the experiments, a plasma is created by breaking down the gas with electron cyclotron resonance heating at 2 kW in the central cell, and the ion species is then heated to high temperatures with ion cyclotron resonance heating at 10 kW in the end cell. A Langmuir probe measured an electron density of 2.5 x 10 to the 16th/cu m and a temperature of 100 eV in the central cell and an ion density of 1.25 x 10 to the 17th/cu m and a temperature of 500 eV in the end cell. 6 refs.

• OSTI ID: 5572927
• Report Number(s): AIAA-Paper--89-2383; CONF-8907118--
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

42 ENGINEERING
420200* -- Engineering-- Facilities
Equipment
& Techniques
ACCELERATION
DESIGN
ECR HEATING
ELEMENTS
ENGINES
FLUID INJECTION
GAS INJECTION
HEATING
HIGH-FREQUENCY HEATING
HYDROGEN
MAGNETIC MIRRORS
NONMETALS
OPEN PLASMA DEVICES
PLASMA
PLASMA ACCELERATION
PLASMA HEATING
PROPULSION
ROCKET ENGINES
TANDEM MIRRORS
THERMONUCLEAR DEVICES