Abstract
A miniature microwave discharge plasma thruster for microsatellites is under development,
with the target power consumption, thrust and specific impulse of 10 W, 1 mN and 1000 s, respectively. We developed the numerical code using Finite Difference Time Domain method and Particle in Cell method to analyze the electron heating by microwave. In this study we analyzed the dependence of the electron heating on the antenna configuration. Results showed the ratio of ECR heating to the heating near the antenna is under 1 %, this means that the ECR heating is not effective in the current thruster configuration. The average absorption power of the super particle with L shape antenna, large disk antenna and small disk antenna are 5.2x10^19 J/timestep 8.2x10^19 J/timestep and 6.6x10^19 J/timestep respectively. These results don’t correspond to the tendency of the experimental results. We have to discuss about the antenna configuration including the plasma exhaust.
