NASA NEXT-C
NASA NEXT-C is a 7-kW-class xenon gridded-ion propulsion system and flight design. NASA technical results specify 0.5–6.9 kW input, 26–236 mN thrust, 1,400–4,190 s specific impulse, and up to 71% efficiency; NEXT-C flew on NASA’s DART mission, while Advanced NEXT remains a separate derivative. No exact DART vehicle-family relationship is asserted here.
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 a 7-kW-class xenon gridded-ion propulsion system and flight design. NASA technical results specify 0.5–6.9 kW input, 26–236 mN thrust, 1,400–4,190 s specific impulse, and up to 71% efficiency; NEXT-C flew on NASA’s DART mission, while Advanced NEXT remains a separate derivative. No exact DART vehicle-family relationship is asserted here.
- Developers
- Electric Specs
- Efficiency
- 0.71
- Input Power Kw Max
- 6.9
- Input Power Kw Min
- 0.5
- Specific Impulse SMax
- 4,190
- Specific Impulse SMin
- 1,400
- Thrust NMax
- 0.236
- Thrust NMin
- 0.026
- Manufacturers
Links
Assets & Meta
- Creation Time
- August 6, 2026 at 21:03:42 UTC
- Updated Time
- August 22, 2026 at 08:06:42 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