Towards full three-dimensional modeling of Hall thruster internal channel discharges

A truly self-consistent model for the anomalous transport in Hall thrusters requires a fully kinetic model in three dimensions. In this work, a three dimensional particle-in-cell code is presented. This uses cylindrical coordinates, and includes the most relevant types of particle collisions from the point of view of electron transport, and also secondary electron emission from the walls. The code is parallelized using a hybrid Open MultiProcessing / Message Passage Interface architecture. The results of a preliminary simulation featuring an SPT-100 thruster geometry, and a reduced extension along the azimuthal direction, are presented. These confirm the expected bulk properties trend, and show the expected azimuthal fluctuations that are the main responsible of the anomalous electron transport.