Numerical Analysis of Active Spacecraft Charging in the Geostationary Environment

摘要

This paper treats the electric-potential characteristics of active spacecraft charging using a full particle-in-cell simulation. A new active spacecraft charging model that considers the velocity distribution of beam particles is proposed. The electric potential of active charging can be calculated numerically and quickly using the new model; by contrast, the conventional model can only express active charging qualitatively, and particle-in-cell simulations require a very high load. The numerical solution of the new model shows very good agreement with the results of the full particle-in-cell simulation for a cubic spacecraft model with electron beam emission.