Ten years of R&D on Hall plasma thrusters (HPTs) in former USSR led to successful tests in space as early as 1972. Nevertheless, they remain actively investigated within the perspective of a routine use in space technologies. This long story underlines the contrast between a rather simple concept and a complex physical background, up to now not fully understood in a quantitative way. This lack of knowledge limits the development of fully predictive simulation codes. Industrial developments are, nevertheless, under way, with new goals in terms of thruster performances. Illustrations of such developments are given, but this paper is mainly focused on a review of recent results and open questions underlined through a coordinated research programme.
前苏联对霍尔等离子体推进器（HPT）的十年研发使其早在1972年就成功进行了太空测试。尽管如此，它们仍处于积极研究之中，以期在太空技术中实现常规应用。这段漫长历程凸显了其概念简单与物理背景复杂之间的鲜明对比，而后者至今尚未被完全定量理解。这种认知的缺乏限制了全预测性仿真代码的发展。然而，工业开发正在推进，其目标在于提升推进器的性能。文中给出了此类开发的实例，但本文主要聚焦于回顾近期成果，并指出通过一项协调研究计划所揭示的开放性问题。