NASA NEXT-C
NASA NEXT-C is the commercial flight development of the 7-kW-class NEXT xenon gridded-ion propulsion technology, demonstrated on DART. The system includes a thruster and power-processing unit, so spacecraft input power and electrical power delivered to the thruster are different quantities. Earlier NEXT development tables report 0.5–6.9 kW thruster power and up to 71 percent efficiency; those historical results are not a single verified flight-unit throttle point. Thruster and power-processor efficiencies must also be distinguished.
Identity
- Aliases
- NEXT-CNASA Evolutionary Xenon Thruster-CommercialNASA NEXT-C
- Domains
- spaceflight
- Identity Level
- model
- Kind
- electric-thruster
- Name
- NASA NEXT-C
- Status
- historical
Details
- Description
- NASA NEXT-C is the commercial flight development of the 7-kW-class NEXT xenon gridded-ion propulsion technology, demonstrated on DART. The system includes a thruster and power-processing unit, so spacecraft input power and electrical power delivered to the thruster are different quantities. Earlier NEXT development tables report 0.5–6.9 kW thruster power and up to 71 percent efficiency; those historical results are not a single verified flight-unit throttle point. Thruster and power-processor efficiencies must also be distinguished.
- Developers
- Electric Specs
- Efficiency
- 0.71
- Input Power Max
- …
- Input Power Min
- …
- Specific Impulse Max
- …
- Specific Impulse Min
- …
- Thrust Max
- …
- Thrust Min
- …
- Manufacturers
Links
Assets & Meta
- Creation Time
- August 6, 2026 at 21:03:42 UTC
- Updated Time
- October 17, 2026 at 12:28:50 UTC
- Image
- Download
Other
- Sources
- Accessed Date
- 2026-08-14
- Note
- NASA’s NEXT-C flight-ion status material identifies the 7-kW-class xenon gridded-ion design and its flight-system development for DART-era electric propulsion.
- Publisher
- NASA Technical Reports Server
- Title
- NEXT-C Flight Ion System Status
- Accessed Date
- 2026-08-14
- Note
- NASA reports the NEXT ion system’s 0.5–6.9 kW power range, 26–236 mN thrust range, 1,400–4,190 s specific impulse range, and 71% maximum efficiency after long-duration testing.
- Publisher
- NASA Technical Reports Server
- Title
- NEXT Ion Propulsion System
- Accessed Date
- 2026-08-14
- Note
- NASA identifies NEXT-C as a commercial evolution of NSTAR and documents the flight-hardware contract boundary.
- Publisher
- NASA
- Title
- NASA Awards Contract for Next Generation Electric Propulsion Components
- Accessed Date
- 2026-10-17
- Publisher
- NASA Technical Reports Server
- Title
- NASA Evolutionary Xenon Thruster-Commercial (NEXT-C)
- Accessed Date
- 2026-10-17
- Publisher
- NASA Technical Reports Server
- Title
- Development Status and Performance Metrics of the Advanced NEXT Ion Propulsion System