Thrust the process.
Undergraduate electric propulsion at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
One thruster, three stages.
We are undergraduates designing, simulating, and testing a gridded ion thruster in a real vacuum chamber. Each of our three subteams owns one stage of it: the plasma source that supplies electrons, the discharge chamber where argon is ionized, and the ion optics that accelerate ions into thrust.
Join, sponsor, or follow along
Join the team
We recruit every fall at Quad Day and our info nights. No propulsion experience needed: plasma physics, CAD, simulation, and electronics all have a place here.
How to joinSupport the build
Sponsorship pays for the vacuum hardware, power supplies, and diagnostics a student-built thruster needs.
Sponsorship tiersFollow along
Design reviews, test days, and outreach events are all on our calendar.
Open the calendar