[FiatLuxDave]

Yes, each particle of the propellant exits the rocket with much higher energy. Since you can only get so much energy from chemical reactions, to get to these higher exit velocities the energy from the solar panels is used. You use a higher ratio of energy to propellant mass than chemical fuels use.

I was at a demo for a plasma engine similar to VASIMR back in the 90's at a national lab. It was a long machine running the length of a large room. There was a window in the side where you could see the plasma. When we showed up there was a faint pinkish plasma barely visible in the window. The guy who was showing us around told us they were just getting ready for the demo and we should wait a few minutes. After a few minutes of the plasma being off, one of the engineers gave a thumbs up. Our guide pulled us close to the window and said "Watch this!". Nothing happened. "One more second!", he said. Then we smelled burning electronics. "Shit!", he said and ran towards the power supplies.

My co-founder and I looked at each other and smiled, because it was so nice to be on the other side of that situation. I knew exactly how the guys felt. Usually we were the ones trying to demo an experiment that sort-of, kind-of worked.

[ethbro]

Side note: hats off to anyone working with high energy plasma.

If I make a mistake in my code, it generally doesn't escape magnetic confinement and instantly vaporize other portions of my system with the fury of the sun.