Engineers from JSC "NIEM" have developed a pulsed plasma engine for microsatellites, which allows reducing the mass of the installation and decreasing power consumption without losing thrust. The solution is aimed at CubeSat class spacecraft and orbit correction tasks.
The key feature is three electrodes in the discharge channel. This scheme forms a stable "hot" discharge in two directions at once, increasing launch reliability and uniformity of propellant consumption.
Plasma is accelerated to 15–30 km/s due to electromagnetic forces, and at the final stage, gas-dynamic acceleration up to 0.5–5 km/s is added.
The mass of the entire unit does not exceed 1.8 kg. This allows integrating the engine into standard 16U platforms without significant redesign of the power system.
The main effect is the synchronization of propellant supply and discharge energy. This increases the proportion of plasma actually involved in creating thrust, and thus, efficiency grows with the same dimensions.