it is disclosed herein a breakthrough concept for in - space propulsion for future air force , nasa and commercial systems . the invention combines the fields of micro - electrical - mechanical devices , optical physics , and nonequilibrium plasmadynamics to reduce dramatically the size of electric thrusters by 1 - 2 orders of magnitude , which when coupled with electrodeless operation and high thruster efficiency , will enable scalable , low - cost , long - life distributable propulsion for control of microsats , nanosats , and space structures . the concept is scalable from power levels of 1 w to tens of kilowatts with thrust efficiency exceeding 60 %. ultimate specific impulse would be 500 seconds with helium , with lower values for heavier gases .