Advanced Space Propulsion CISAS Propulsion Group
Thesis topics: In RF plasma sources (e.g., Helicon plasma sources), RF antennas working in the MHz range ionize and heat the plasma by means of EM waves coupling. The higher the power coupled by the antenna the best the source.
Thesis activity: preiliminar analysis of electromagnetic behaviour of antennas facing plasmas (literature review), understanding of the complex mechanism of electromagnetic coupling between a RF antenna and an anisotropic medium (i.e., plasma), simulation of detailed antenna design with ADAMANT code.
Outcome: design of new-concept RF antennas for plasma sources (w.r.t. Space Thruster & Industrial applications) providing the best power coupling into the plasma.
Pubblications either on scientific journals or conference proceedings can be considered depending on the work quality.
Competences requested: None.
Duration: work load decided as need be.
Collaboration: TU/e Technical University of Eindhoven, (Eindhoven, the Netherlands).
Thesis on Plasma & ElectroMagnetics
Thesis topics: In RF plasma sources (e.g., Helicon plasma sources), RF antennas working in the MHz range ionize and heat the plasma by means of EM waves coupling. The resulting plasma is confined by a magneto-static field. This confinement field along with the RF antenna allows the propagation of EM waves, which deposit energy in the plasma.
Thesis activity: understanding of physical phenomena in the plasma source (literature review), preliminar assessment of plasma discharge parameters (e.g., neutral gas type, plasma density, magneto-static field) influence on wave propagation and absorption phenomena with SPIREs code, detailed simulation with ADAMANT code.
Outcome: detailed characterization of plasma parameters providing the best power deposition into the plasma source (w.r.t. Space Thruster & Industrial applications).
Pubblications either on scientific journals or conference proceedings can be considered depending on the work quality.
Competences requested: basic plasma physics knowledge is a plus.
Duration: work load decided as need be.
Collaboration: TU/e Technical University of Eindhoven (Eindhoven, the Netherlands), ENEA-EURATOM Frascati (Rome, Italy).
Thesis topics: Gaseous plasma antenna is a brand new antenna concept, offering huge possibilities in terms of communication performance reconfigurability stemming from plasma peculiar nature.
Thesis activity: understanding of physical phenomena in the electromagnetic signal travelling through a plasma medium (literature review), simulation of different plasma antenna set-ups with ADAMANT, experimental mock-ups development and measurements.
Outcome: assessment of the influence of plasma parameters on communication performance (w.r.t Antennas & SAR & GPS applications), experimental mock-ups realization and measurements.
Pubblications either on scientific journals or conference proceedings can be considered depending on the work quality.
Competences requested: antenna design is a plus.
Duration: work load decided as need be.
Collaboration: TU/e Technical University of Eindhoven (Eindhoven, the Netherlands).
Thesis topics: Plasma and Electromagnetics simulations can be quite demanding from a computational point of view. In order either to reduce simulation times or simulate larger and larger problems, parallelization and sparsification strategies are necessary.
Thesis activity: develop an optimized version of ADAMANT code. Run simulations under HPC environment (e.g., CINECA).
Outcome: Optimized version of the code, numerical sensitivity analysis, speed-up evaluation.
Pubblications either on scientific journals or conference proceedings can be considered depending on the work quality.
Competences requested: Fortran knowledge is required, parallel coding skills is a plus.
Duration: work load decided as need be.
Collaboration: TU/e Technical University of Eindhoven (Eindhoven, the Netherlands).
Thesis topics: Plasma sources are used to replicate harsh working conditions that can be found in plasma fusion machines (i.e., tokamaks). Specifically, a plasma linear experiment (APEL) has been realized to study Plasma-Material interactions occuring at the confinement wall inside a tokamak. The realization of the same working conditions in terms of either density or temperature is necessary.
Thesis activity: understanding of physical phenomena in the plasma source (literature review), detailed simulation with F3MPIC code, comparison of discharge parameters (e.g.,plasma density) against experimental results coming from APEL device (India).
Outcome: detailed characterization of plasma parameters inside the source, and analysis of counter propagating ExB drifts.
Pubblications either on scientific journals or conference proceedings can be considered depending on the work quality.
Competences requested: basic plasma physics knowledge is a plus.
Duration: work load decided as need be.
Collaboration: Institute for Plasma Research (Gandhinagar,India).