# Obituary: Alexander (Sasha) Kapulkin

Maxim Rubanovych, Vladimir Balabanov, Yevgeny Raitses, Michael Keidar, Vladimir Kim, Igal Kronhaus, Yakov Krasik, Binyamin Rubin, Sedina Tsikata, Omri Hamo, et al.

► To cite this version:

Maxim Rubanovych, Vladimir Balabanov, Yevgeny Raitses, Michael Keidar, Vladimir Kim, et al.. Obituary: Alexander (Sasha) Kapulkin. Journal of Electric Propulsion, 2022, 1 (1), pp.15. 10.1007/s44205-022-00018-7. hal-05400890

HAL Id: hal-05400890

https://cnrs.hal.science/hal-05400890v1

Submitted on 5 Dec 2025

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# Obituary: Alexander (Sasha) Kapulkin

Maxim Rubanovych<fnref n="1" />, Vladimir Balabanov<fnref n="1" />, Yevgeny Raitses<fnref n="2" />, Michael Keidar<fnref n="3" />*, Vladimir Kim<fnref n="4" />, Igal Kronhaus<fnref n="5" />, Yakov Krasik<fnref n="6" />, Binyamin (Benny) Rubin<fnref n="7" />, Sedina Tsikata<fnref n="8" />, Omri Hamo<fnref n="9" />, Dan Lev<fnref n="10" />, Alexander Semenkin<fnref n="11" /> and Sergey Khartov<fnref n="12" />

<figure><img src="image_3.png" /></figure>

<footnote>*Correspondence:</footnote>

<footnote>Michael Keidar</footnote>

<footnote>keidar@gwu.edu</footnote>

<footnote n="1">¹Asher Space Research Institute,
Technion – Institute of Technology,
3200001 Haifa, Israel</footnote>

<footnote n="2">²Princeton Plasma Physics
Laboratory, 08543 Princeton, NJ,
USA</footnote>

<footnote n="3">³Department of Mechanical and
Aerospace Engineering, The George
Washington University, Washington,
DC, USA</footnote>

<footnote n="4">⁴Moscow Aviation Institute,
Moscow, Russia</footnote>

<footnote n="5">⁵Space Plasmatics Ltd,
3474121 Haifa, Israel</footnote>

<footnote n="6">⁶Physics Department, Technion
– Israel Institute of Technology,
32000 Haifa, Israel</footnote>

<footnote n="7">⁷Veeco Instruments,
11803 Plainview, NY, United States
of America</footnote>

<footnote n="8">⁸CNRS (Centre National de la
Recherche Scientifique), ICARE,
45071 Orléans, France</footnote>

<footnote n="9">⁹Faculty of Aerospace Engineering,
Technion - Israel Institute of
Technology, 3200003 Haifa, Israel</footnote>

<footnote n="10">¹⁰High Power Electric Propulsion
Laboratory (HPEPL), Georgia
Institute of Technology,
30318 Atlanta, GA, USA</footnote>

<footnote n="11">¹¹Bauman State Technical
University, Moscow, Russia</footnote>

<footnote n="12">¹²Moscow Aviation Institute,
Moscow, Russia</footnote>
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It is with great sadness we inform you that our teacher, colleague, collaborator, and friend Alexander (Sasha) Kapulkin, PhD, passed away on the morning of September 19, 2022, at Nahariya Hospital, Israel, at the age of 79.

Sasha was a fervent member of the international electric propulsion community for decades. His scientific contributions to the physics of crossed-field plasmas and relevant plasma devices including, but not limited to, characteristic waves and instabilities, and innovative Hall thruster designs have had a tremendous and determinant impact on these fields.

He was educated on electric propulsion in Russia in the 60 and 70 s, and was part of the group tracking the first mission to operate a Hall thruster (SPT-50) in space in 1971
on board the Meteor satellite. In the subsequent years, Sasha worked on the research and development of novel Hall thrusters while employing his fundamental knowledge in plasma physics and his sharp analytical and experimental skills. While being a plasma theorist by training, Sasha's achievements in the field combine the development of theory of major electrostatic instabilities in ExB plasmas with the development and implementation of original practical ideas of means to control and mitigate these instabilities and overcome lifetime limitations in plasma thrusters. Through these achievements, Sasha followed in the footsteps of his doctoral advisor, Alexei Ivanovich Morozov – an electric propulsion pioneer, a great plasma theorist and one of the inventors of Hall thrusters in Russia.

Back in the former USSR, Sasha spent most of his scientific and academic career as a Professor at the Dnipropetrovsk State University in Dnipro, Ukraine. In 1999, at the age of 56, Sasha Kapulkin immigrated with his family to Israel where he joined the Asher Space Research Institute (ASRI) as a senior researcher. At ASRI, Sasha continued to work on electric propulsion and was one of the pioneers to introduce the technology in Israel, laying the groundwork for many technological developments to come.

Through his works, Sasha will also be remembered as the leading researcher behind novel types of low power Hall effect thrusters such as the co-axial longitudinal anode Hall thruster (CAMILA) and the wall-less thruster (named the “outside electric field thruster”) that inspire innovation in this field to this day.

Despite his age, Sasha did not stop working on plasma physics and electric propulsion, even during the Covid lockdown. He continued to work from home and came to the lab whenever he could.

Sasha will be fondly remembered as a teacher who passed his passion for plasma physics to the next generation of electric propulsion and plasma scientists. He will also be remembered as a very calm and friendly person in day-to-day life, a true gentleman and romantic, but a scientist who had “no mercy” when discussing science – typical quality signatures of Soviet era scientists which are missed in our time.

Sasha will be greatly missed by his friends, colleagues, and the greater electric propulsion and plasma physics communities.

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