Transport Coefficients of Two-temperature Lithium Plasma for Space Propulsion Applications

Lithium has been proposed as an attractive metal propellant for advanced electric propulsion. In our current work, transport coefficients including the viscosity, thermal conductivity, and electrical conductivity of lithium plasma under both the equilibrium and non-equilibrium conditions are calculated based on a two-temperature model. The collision integrals used in calculating the transport coefficients are significantly more accurate than values used in previous theoretical studies, resulting in more reliable values of the transport coefficients. Results are computed for different degrees of thermal non-equilibrium, i.e. the ratio of electron to heavy particle temperatures, from 1 to 15, with the electron temperature ranging from 300 to 60,000 K in a wide pressure range from 0.0001 to 100 atm. We compare our calculated results with existing published results and discrepancies are found and explained.