Ground-based experiments of a spacecraft plasma contactor using a hollow cathode

In the future, a plasma contactor using a hollow cathode will be applied to charging mitigation of large structures and electron emitter/collector of electrodynamic tether systems in space. In this study, ground-based experiments on the plasma contactor were carried out to examine basic operational characteristics. In electron emission, the same operational performance as that only with a simple assembly of the hollow cathode was obtained in the simulating low-earth-orbit (LEO) plasma. In electron collection, the excellent effect of collection current enhanced in the simulating LEO plasma existed. Furthermore, the mechanism of electron collection by the plasma contactor was examined from plasma parameter distributions near the plasma contactor. As a result, an intensive interaction between the contactor plasma and the simulating LEO plasma was observed. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.