US Patent Issued to Board of Trustees of the University of Alabama, for and On Behalf of The University of Alabama in Huntsville on April 14 for "Additively manufactured components for electric propulsion thrusters" (Alabama, Tennessee Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., April 15 -- United States Patent no. 12,601,331, issued on April 14, was assigned to Board of Trustees of the University of Alabama, for and On Behalf of The University of Alabama in Huntsville (Huntsville, Ala.).

"Additively manufactured components for electric propulsion thrusters" was invented by Kunning Gabriel Xu (Brownsboro, Ala.) and Sydney D. Miller (Murfreesboro, Tenn.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A Hall effect thruster is provided having one or more components fabricated using additive manufacturing techniques. Additive manufacturing can be used to fabricate the magnetic flux guide and the discharge channel of the thruster. In addition, the propellant distributor ...