Towards multiply charged Xenon ions in HT simulations: development of a self-consistent PIC-MCC ionization module

Since their original development, measurements in Hall Thruster (HT) have indicated non-negligeable presence of multiply-charged ions in the plume. While their presence is widely accepted, their behavior in the plasma and their contributions to HTs' performances are currently poorly understood. Noticeably, in the field of numerical simulations, only few authors have investigated the effects of their inclusion. Recently, multiply charged ion's impact on electron transport was brought to attention, highlighting the importance of kinetic processes caused by their addition. Ion contribution to the total discharge current and losses mechanisms were also proven to be highly impacted. In this work, we first present the effects of considering a fixed percentage of doubly charged ions in collisionless axial-azimuthal particle-in-cell simulations of a HT. Subsequently, we examine the different ionization mechanisms that can produce these species. Then, we face the task of self-consistently (i.e. to create multiply charged ions within the Monte Carlo collision module) accounting for the presence of these particles to study their impact on HT discharges.