173 results about "Spacecraft propulsion" patented technology

To provide an aircraft propulsion system which can secure the optimum thrust and thrust vector for flight conditions, as well as the optimum sectional area for the engine, and which is highly compatible with the environment.An electrical generator is coupled to a turbofan engine, the electrical generator is driven by output power of the turbofan engine to output electric power, and an electromagnetic driving fan is driven by the electric power. On the other hand, after bringing each of coils in the electromagnetic driving fan to a superconductive state, liquid hydrogen is introduced to a heat exchanger, collects the energy of exhaust as heat, is then vaporized, and thereafter supplied to a combustor and to a fuel cell. Further, the electromagnetic driving fan is changed in its rotational phase by a rotating mechanism portion, is made movable in a width direction of a wing and a wing chord direction by a slide mechanism portion, and can be stored inside or outside the wing by a storage mechanism portion.

An aircraft propulsion system comprises a power plant driving a number of outboard propulsion units to propel a fixed wing aircraft.

A fuel-free spacecraft propelling system based on spatial atomic oxygen comprises an outer cylinder of a propelling device and an atomic oxygen collecting device. Two ends of the outer cylinder are open, the atomic oxygen collecting device is arranged at the front end of the outer cylinder propelling forwards and is hermetically connected with a radio frequency generating device and an ion cyclotron wave heating device through a magnetic confinement device, a spiral wave discharge oxygen plasma inlet and a spiral wave discharge oxygen plasma outlet in the ion cyclotron wave heating device are respectively provided with another magnetic confinement device, the atomic oxygen collecting device is used for pressurizing the spatial atomic oxygen entering the front end of the outer cylinder of the propelling device, the pressurized spatial atomic oxygen is ionized in a spiral wave discharge mode in the radio frequency generating device, the kinetic energy of oxygen ions in ionized oxygen plasma is increased in the ion cyclotron wave heating device, magnetic field configuration of a sprayer is changed by adjusting the magnetic confinement devices in the ion cyclotron wave heating device, accordingly, circumferential movement of the oxygen ions is transformed into parallel movement, and propelling force is provided for the spacecraft after the oxygen ions are sprayed out of the sprayer. Compared with the traditional fuel-borne electric propulsion technology, the fuel-free spacecraft propelling system using spatial environment particles does not need to carry working media and enables a spacecraft to work on an orbit in the whole life cycle.

A thruster has a chamber defined within a tube. The tube has a longitudinal axis which defines an axis of thrust; an injector injects ionizable gas within the tube, at one end of the chamber. A magnetic field generator with two coils generates a magnetic field parallel to the axis; the magnetic field has two maxima along the axis; an electromagnetic field generator has a first resonant cavity between the two coils generating a microwave ionizing field at the electron cyclotron resonance in the chamber, between the two maxima of the magnetic field. The electromagnetic field generator has a second resonant cavity on the other side of the second coil. The second resonant cavity generates a ponderomotive accelerating field accelerating the ionized gas. The thruster ionizes the gas by electron cyclotron resonance, and subsequently accelerates both electrons and ions by the magnetized ponderomotive force.

A thermo-chemical nanoparticle generator for the controlled production of nanoparticles, and a method of controllably producing nanoparticles are provided. The combustion of a carbon based propellant under the controlled variation of combustion parameters (temperature, pressure and stoichiometry) allows for the production of ionized nanoparticles of a defined mass. In addition, with the assistance of a high voltage generator a combined ionized gas- / solid particle plasma stream can be produced, which can accelerated in an acceleration tube to high emission velocities allowing for applications of the invention ranging from spacecraft propulsion to plasma welding.

The invention relates to the field of spacecraft propulsion, and more specifically to electrically powered spacecraft propulsion. A spacecraft propulsion system (100) according to the invention includes at least one electrostatic thruster (101) with at least one first electricity consumer, a resistojet (102), a circuit (104) for supplying a propellant fluid, and a circuit (103) for supplying electricity comprising at least one first electricity supply line (131) and a first switch (114-1, 114'-1, 114"-1) making it possible to choose between connecting said first electricity supply line (131) to the resistojet (102) and connecting said first electricity supply line (131) to said first electricity consumer of the electrostatic thruster (101). This system thus allows the application of a spacecraft propulsion method including a switching step for selecting a first propulsion mode, in which the resistojet (102) is activated, or a second propulsion mode, in which the electrostatic thruster (101) is activated.