Plasma Diagnostics in High Current Hollow Cathode

Abstract

In recent years, high power electric propulsion systems in the range of several tens to 100 kW are under development for the cargo of the manned missions or the satellite market. The thrusters for these propulsion systems require around 100 A of the discharge current. For these applications, we have been developing a 100 A class hollow cathode. To appropriate the electron emission processes of the LaB₆ insert in a 100 A class Hollow Cathode, the characteristics and the diagnostics by single Langmuir probing were investigated. In this paper we report the results and the guidelines for the next step in a 100 A class heaterless hollow cathode.