| 4-th State of Matter The first step to understanding how a plasma rocket operates is learning about plasma. A plasma state can be achieved when a substance in its gaseous state is heated to very high temperatures - tens of thousands to millions of degrees. At this temperatures, electrons are stripped, or lost, from the neutral atoms. |
Plasma In the overheated gas, electrons, which hold a negative charge, and ionized atoms, which hold a positive charge, mixed together making an electrically neutral "soup" of charged particles that is a plasma. This is a very common occurrence in nature. In fact, 99 percent of the visible universe is in some form of a plasma state, including lightning, very hot flames, nebulas, the Sun and other stars. The plasmas at the extreme temperatures required of a plasma rocket cannot be contained by any known material. Fortunately, plasmas can be controlled by a magnetic field. 
VX-200 plasma generated from Argon gas with 10 kW RF power |
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