A configurable ion source for validating spaceflight-based thermal plasma measurement systems

Thermal ion instruments are valuable for analyzing Earth’s upper atmosphere. Prelaunch vacuum chamber testing of such instruments with a thermal ion source is often used to validate the performance of such instruments in a relevant environment, which is a prerequisite for a NASA flight. In this paper, we describe a new ion source that can be used for such tests, compare its performance with simulation results, and present an example of the utility for the source for validating the performance of an instrument.