Fig. 1.

Bottlenecks and nanomaterial-based solutions for electric thruster. Reduction of the ion flux-related wear of an acceleration channel material and enhancement of discharge efficiency by using, e.g., nanodiamond coatings and ultra-compact boron nitride; enhancement of cathode efficiency by using cold emission insets made of dense brushes of long, ultra-thing nanotubes, nanowires, and vertically oriented graphene flakes; optimization of the magnetic circuit by the use of magnet-active graphenes; application of light, durable materials made of carbon nanotube yarns for the propulsion system parts are among the major challenges