Studies of Plasmas and MHD Interactions in Supersonic Flows

Abstract

Work this past year has involved theoretical and experimental efforts directed towards exploiting the use of MHD and plasmas for boundary layer control, the development of a new concept for power extraction from high temperature surfaces, and the development of a new diagnostic for plasmas and high-speed flows. Two control strategies are being examined: the snow-plow arc and the dielectric barrier discharge. The snowplow arc uses a constricted surface discharge which is accelerated by a magnetic field and pushes the air with it. The dielectric barrier discharge uses an electric field gradient along the surface that couples to the flow. Theoretical work has focused on the optimization of both of these concepts for efficient control of boundary layers in high speed flow and on interactions with AFRL on model development and validation. The power extraction concept involves the development of a new pulse sustained thermionic flatpanel for extracting power from hot surfaces. The new diagnostic is Radar REMPI, which is based on scattering of microwave radiation from a small laser-induced ionization region in a flowing gas, combusting zone, or plasma. It has the potential for local temperature, velocity, species, and electron density measurements.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 01, 2006
Accession Number
AD1026499

Entities

People

  • Richard B. Miles
  • Sergey Macheret

Organizations

  • Princeton University

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Advanced Electronics
  • Energy and Power Technologies
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Air Force Research Laboratories
  • Boundaries
  • Boundary Layer
  • Boundary Layer Control
  • Electric Fields
  • Electromagnetic Fields
  • Electron Density
  • Electrons
  • Flow
  • High Temperature
  • High Voltage
  • Magnetic Fields
  • Measurement
  • Radiation
  • Scattering
  • Supersonic Flow
  • Temperature Gradients

Fields of Study

  • Physics

Readers

  • Military Science and Technology Research and Modernization.
  • Plasma Physics.
  • Pulsed Power and Plasma Physics.

Technology Areas

  • Directed Energy
  • Hypersonics
  • Microelectronics