Vacuum Arc Thruster architecture for green orbit maintenance with small satellite missions

The number of satellite space missions has increased in recent decades, this given the ease of access to space-grade components for new actors in the field. This democratization, although it has made it possible to achieve the goals of different sectors, increases the probability of inter-satellite collisions and, with these, the generation of space debris. The way proposed to prevent a satellite space mission from generating debris at the end of its lifetime is by performing a maneuver to re-enter the atmosphere so that the structure and components of the satellite disintegrate. For that purpose, a micro-thruster architecture based on a Vacuum Arc Thruster (VAT) is designed by proposing the physical architecture of the system, mapping functions modeled by standard languages to specific components and its logical architecture for the control of the device through a state model that allows executing timed and scheduled ignitions and, additionally, the monitoring of the incidence of inter-electrode welding, which is one of the main causes of failures in VATs. A simulation model was implemented based on recent theoretical models to verify the interaction between both architectures. Finally, the paper demonstrates the performance achieved by the proposed design in comparison with other benchmark solutions.