Rise through the Atmosphere of a Hot Bubble

Abstract

The Particle-in-Cell method for multidimensional fluid-dynamics calculations has been used on the IBM Stretch Computer to study the motion of a hot gas bubble created by a nuclear explosion in the earth's atmosphere. In the example, a total energy of 8.24 x 10(exp 20) ergs was deposited at an altitude of 95 km. After 2.85 sec the originally-heated air was moving upwards with a mass-averaged velocity of 3.5km/sec and was still accelerating somewhat, probably to an asymptotic value of 4.0 km/sec. Along the cylindrical axis at 2.85 sec, the upwards velocities varied from 0.0 km/sec at the bottom to 5.8 km/sec at the top; most of the central material was moving at velocities greater than 4.0 km/sec. This report also includes details concerning bubble shape, energy histories, and shock configurations.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Nov 13, 1962
Accession Number
ADA382489

Entities

People

  • Billy D. Meixner
  • Francis H. Harlow

Organizations

  • Los Alamos National Laboratory

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Energy and Power Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Atmospheres
  • Atmospheric Density
  • Computers
  • Contractors
  • Dynamics
  • Energy
  • Fluid Dynamics
  • High Altitude
  • Hot Gases
  • Kinetic Energy
  • New Mexico
  • Nuclear Explosions
  • Particles
  • Physics
  • Radial Velocity
  • Sequences
  • United States

Fields of Study

  • Physics

Readers

  • Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD)
  • Explosive Engineering.
  • Underwater engineering and Marine Technology.