Advanced Space Propulsion

Over the past several decades, hoping for accelerated scientific returns, the space industry has eagerly researched propulsion. This has resulted in an array of breakthrough technologies that would allow not only more rapid missions to further study the planets and asteroids within our solar system, but also ventures to distant destinations into deep space, or even enabling human settlements on the moon, Mars, and beyond.

Advanced Space Propulsion: Technologies, Missions, and Computer Modeling includes coverage of all these technologies in an integrated manner. The volume, written by a team of sector-specific R&D experts, touches upon fundamentals cardinal to the understanding of [i] orbit theory and its implications for control, estimation, and optimization of trajectory and attitude and [ii] how each mission is designed (depending primarily on the mass of the payload, but also on how far from Earth the launch vehicle needs to go), and then succeeds in consolidating them with software and computer applications for simulations and modeling. It continues with a discussion on the complete gamut of in-space propulsion power sources and concludes with both human and robotic mission-related case studies and future implementation examples.

The outcome is a carefully calibrated and self-contained resource that will prove to be invaluable for graduate and senior undergraduate students, researchers, scientists, and engineering professionals alike.

Mr. Paluszek is President of Princeton Satellite Systems (PSS), which he founded in 1992. He holds an Engineer's degree in Aeronautics and Astronautics (1979), an SM in Aeronautics and Astronautics (1979), and an SB in Electrical Engineering (1976), all from MIT. He is the PI on the ARPA-E OPEN grant to develop a compact nuclear fusion reactor based on the Princeton Field Reversed Configuration concept. He is also PI on the ARPA-E GAMOW project to develop power electronics for the fusion industry. He is PI on a project to design a closed-loop Brayton Cycle heat engine for space applications. Prior to founding PSS, he worked at GE Astro Space in East Windsor, NJ. At GE, he designed or led the design of several attitude control systems including GPS IIR, Inmarsat 3, and GGS Polar platform. He also was an ACS analyst on over a dozen satellite launches, including the GSTAR III recovery. Before joining GE, he worked at the Draper Laboratory and at MIT, where he still teaches Attitude Control Systems (course 16.S685/16.S890). He has 14 patents registered to his name.

Ms. Thomas is Vice-President of Princeton Satellite Systems (PSS). She has an SB and SM from MIT in Aeronautics and Astronautics (1999 and 2001, respectively). She has co-authored three books on programming and machine learning with her long-time colleague, Mr. Michael Paluszek. She has led numerous research grants on advanced control topics in her 20 years at PSS, including fusion propulsion, solar sails, formation flying, autonomous rendezvous and proximity operations, orbit optimization, and precision attitude control. She is the vice-chair of the AIAA Nuclear and Future Flight Propulsion committee and a member of the Fusion Industry Association's Space committee.

Dr. Galea is a Research Scientist at Princeton Satellite Systems (PSS). He has an SB from MIT in Aerospace Engineering and Physics (2016) and a PhD from Princeton University in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, with a specialization in Applied Physics (2021). At PSS, Dr. Galea is responsible for R&D in plasma physics for fusion applications, power electronics, and aerospace technology. During his PhD, Dr. Galea investigated the implementation of a laser- and microwave-based diagnostic technique in environments relevant to plasma propulsion and remote sensing applications. In summer 2020, he interned at Facebook Reality Labs Research as a researcher in optical engineering. During his time at MIT, Dr. Galea conducted research at the MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center, the MIT Gas Turbine Laboratory, and the Polytechnic University of Madrid in Spain. It was also during his time at MIT that he first interned at PSS.

Ms. Mirdamadi is currently working as technical staff for Princeton Satellite Systems. Her previous work includes research done with NASA Glenn Research Center in the Radioisotope Power Systems Program and projects at Collins Aerospace in their power and controls unit. She specializes in nuclear power and spacecraft systems and has been published in the ANS Nuclear and Emerging Technologies for Space proceedings. She is currently enrolled at Arizona State University for a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering with a focus on electric power and energy systems.

Joyce Mo is a Project Engineer at Princeton Satellite Systems. She graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Engineering from Princeton University in 2024. Prior to graduation, she received the Stoll Fellowship and High Meadows Environmental Institute Scholarship for her research in the Jose Avalos Laboratory. Her work also included computational modeling of yeast branched-chain amino acid gene regulatory networks. Additionally, Joyce has worked on projects in temperature control for thermally-heated outdoor spaces, reinforcement learning, and model predictive control of biological processes. At PSS, Joyce is responsible for the design of a thermal management system for power electronics for plasmas, computational fluid dynamics analysis of varied hypersonic aircraft designs, and heat engine analysis. She is the project lead on the advancement of Space Rapid Transit, a two stage to orbit horizontal, fully-reusable launch vehicle, and a micro combined cycle power plant for spacecraft. Prior to her role at PSS, she completed internships at Sampled, Telethon Kids Institute, and a research exchange program at the Technical University of Munich in process engineering and water membrane flux analysis.