Preliminary Sizing of Electric-Propulsion Powertrains for Concept Aircraft Designs

Concept designs for NASA’s Solar Electric Propulsion Technology Demonstration Mission

Multiple Solar Electric Propulsion Technology Demonstration Mission were developed to assess vehicle performance and estimated mission cost. Concepts ranged from a 10,000 kg spacecraft capable of delivering 4000 kg of payload to one of the Earth Moon Lagrange points in support of future human-crewed outposts to a 180 kg spacecraft capable of performing an asteroid rendezvous mission after launc...

Propulsion Electric Grid Simulator (PEGS) for Future Turboelectric Distributed Propulsion Aircraft

NASA Glenn Research Center, in collaboration with the aerospace industry and academia, has begun the development of technology for a future hybrid-wing body electric airplane with a turboelectric distributed propulsion (TeDP) system. It is essential to design a subscale system to emulate the TeDP power grid, which would enable rapid analysis and demonstration of the proof-of-concept of the TeDP...

Microspike Based Chemical/Electric Thruster Concept for Versatile Nanosat Propulsion

Small spacecraft that can be categorized as microsats, nanosats, and picosats has a strong potential for wide applications in communication, scientific experiments, and space exploration. In order to combine the advantages of both electric and chemical propulsion thrusters, a dual-mode microspike based thruster concept is proposed. For a fixed input power, it can operate in either a high-Isp mo...

Propulsion of Aircraft

Protodrive: Simulation of Electric Vehicle Powertrains

Electric vehicles are a promising alternative to vehicles powered by fossil fuels due to their cleaner energy emission, but current limitations in battery technology are preventing electric vehicles from burgeoning in the mass consumer market. Therefore, simulating and prototyping various power trains become paramount for finding different energy efficient models. A portable power train platfor...