Plasma inside a small Hall thruster for satellites

The plasma properties inside the channel of a small Hall effect thruster (petit propulseur innovant) equipped with permanent magnets are analysed by the fluid numerical code HETMAn. The local variables of electron density, electron and ion currents, and parallel and perpendicular electron temperatures are calculated as functions of time. The time-dependent and averaged values of the thruster performance (thrust: 13 mN, specific impulse: 1328 s) are obtained. The global efficiency is 34%.