Design of a Subscale, Inert Gas Test for Plume-Surface Interactions in a Reduced Pressure Environment

Korzun, Ashley M.; Eberhart, Chad J.; West, Jeffrey S.; Liever, Peter A.; Weaver, Amanda; Mantovani, J. G.; Langton, Austin; Kemmerer, Beverly W.; Atkins, Austin R.

doi:10.2514/6.2022-1808

Cited by 13 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…can cause chemical contamination that can interfere with scientific measurements, while the ionization of plume gas can interfere with radar signals [10,11]. While plume physics processes are significant, PIE will not be measuring characteristics of the plume directly, but other instruments under development will be.…”

Section: Past Missionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In addition, rocket plume gas injected into the permeable regolith Plume physics processes refers to the plume gas interactions with the environment, which can lead to aerodynamic destabilization of spacecraft during landing and cause high convective heating. In addition, rocket plume gas injected into the permeable regolith can cause chemical contamination that can interfere with scientific measurements, while the ionization of plume gas can interfere with radar signals [10,11]. While plume physics Aerospace 2024, 11, 439 3 of 17 processes are significant, PIE will not be measuring characteristics of the plume directly, but other instruments under development will be.…”

Section: Introduction 1overview Of Psi and Its Importancementioning

confidence: 99%

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Instrument to Study Plume Surface Interactions (PSI) on the Lunar Surface: Science Motivation, Requirements, Instrument Overview, and Test Plans

Bueno,

Krasowski,

Prokop

et al. 2024

Aerospace

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Safe landings are imperative to accomplish NASA’s Artemis goal to enable human exploration on the Moon, including sample collection missions. However, a process known as plume surface interaction (PSI) presents a significant hazard to lunar landings. PSI occurs when the engine exhaust of a lander interacts with the surface ejecting large amounts of regolith particles at high velocities that can interfere with the landing, disturb the surface, and damage hardware. To better understand PSI, the particle impact event (PIE) sensor is being developed to measure the kinetic energy and the flux of ejecta during landings, to quantify the potential damage, and to quantify the ejecta displaced. Multiple parameters were estimated to define the PIE instrument requirements. These estimates demonstrate that ejecta can travel at velocities of up to 800 m/s and impact the surrounding area with energies of up to 400 µJ. A significant amount of ejecta can be deposited several 10 s of meters away from the landing site, modifying the surface and causing dust-related challenges. The PIE sensor will be launched for the first time in an upcoming lunar lander. Then, PIE measurements will be used to improve PSI prediction capabilities and develop mitigation strategies to ensure safe landings.

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Section: Past Missionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introduction 1overview Of Psi and Its Importancementioning

confidence: 99%

Instrument to Study Plume Surface Interactions (PSI) on the Lunar Surface: Science Motivation, Requirements, Instrument Overview, and Test Plans

Bueno,

Krasowski,

Prokop

et al. 2024

Aerospace

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“…The plume from reverse-thrusters or the main-thruster of a landing module can present various risks to the lander itself. The plume surface interaction (PSI) can be characterised through various mechanisms, such as cratering of the regolith, erosion, and ejecta dynamics Korzun et al (2022). During the erosion and ejecta processes, the rocket exhaust plume will fluidise granules on the lunar surface, and the entrained particles can interact with the landing module, changing its stability characteristics.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, these experiments were conducted under the ambient Earth atmosphere rather than in a vacuum chamber. In the Physics Focused Ground Test campaign at NASA Korzun et al (2022), a series of scaled ground tests have been conducted to provide benchmarking PSI data in a low-pressure environment. In their experimental design, a splitter plate with a 38 °leading edge was implemented to bisect the plume and allow for the observation of two-dimensional soil erosion.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Lunar plume-surface interactions using rarefiedMultiphaseFoam

et al. 2023

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Understanding plume-surface interactions is essential to the design of lander modules and potential bases on bodies such as the Moon, as it is important to predict erosion patterns on the surface and the transport of the displaced regolith material. Experimentally, it is difficult to replicate the extra-terrestrial conditions (e.g. the effects of reduced gravity). Existing numerical tools have limited accessibility and different levels of sophistication in the modelling of regolith entrainment and subsequent transport. In this work, a fully transient open source code for solving rarefied multiphase flows, rarefiedMultiphaseFoam, is updated with models to account for solid-solid interactions and applied to rocket exhaust plume-lunar regolith interactions. Two different models to account for the solid-solid collisions are considered; at relatively low volume fractions, a stochastic collision model, and at higher volume fractions the higher fidelity multiphase particle-in-cell (MPPIC) method. Both methods are applied to a scaled down version of the Apollo era lunar module descent engine and comparisons are drawn between the transient simulation results. It is found that the transient effects are important for the gas phase, with the shock structure and stand-off height changing as the regolith is eroded by the plume. Both models predict cratering at early times and similar dispersion characteristics as the viscous erosion becomes dominant. In general, the erosion processes are slower with the multiphase particle-in-cell method because it accounts for more physical effects, such as enduring contacts and a maximum packing limit. It is found that even if the initial volume fraction is low, the stochastic collision method can become unreliable as the plume impinges on the surface and compresses the regolith particles, invalidating the method’s assumption of only binary collisions. Additionally, it is shown that the breakdown of the locally free-molecular flow assumption that is used to calculate the drag and heat transfer on the solid particles has a strong influence on the temperatures that the solid particles obtain.

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“…They are most suitable for dilute conditions, with measurement uncertainties that increase with concentration. At volume fractions above 0.1%-0.01%, depending on the particle size and material properties, optical diagnostics fail due to the opacity of the particlefluid mixture [25], [26]. Measurements in particle-laden flows also face other challenges absent in single-phase flows as particles can coat or damage experimental hardware through erosion, impact, mechanical jamming, or triboelectric charging [27], hindering the use of classical intrusive instrumentation.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Millimeter-Wave Interferometry for Opaque Particle-Laden Flows

Rasmont

Al-Rashdan

Elliott

et al. 2023

IEEE Trans. Microwave Theory Techn.

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A novel method to measure the concentration of particles in optically opaque particle-laden flows is presented. This method is based on the principle of millimeter wave interferometry, using a fully-integrated frequency modulated continuouswave (FMCW) radar operating between 77 and 81 GHz to measure path-integrated particle concentrations between the radar and a reflector. The instrument is capable of quantitative, high-speed (20 kHz) path-integrated concentration measurements in dispersed multiphase flows with concentrations one to two orders of magnitude higher than those at reach with state-ofthe-art optical methods. The interferometer was demonstrated and calibrated for path-integrated number concentrations up to (4.36 ± 0.24) × 10 8 m −2 using glass microspheres with a mean diameter of 109.2 µm. Two independent measurements of particle size distribution (PSD) were performed using X-ray microtomography and dry sieving. The calibration setup relied on high-resolution particle shadowgraphy applied to individual thin particle streams and used multistreams superposition to reproduce large optical depths in a controlled particle-air mixture. The instrument exhibited excellent linearity and low error during the calibration, with a phase shift-to-number concentration slope of (1.378 ± 0.043) × 10 −7 m 2 , validating the measurement concept and paving the way for practical applications. The leading uncertainties are discussed, providing guidelines for exploiting the measurement concept without necessarily performing a direct calibration.

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Design of a Subscale, Inert Gas Test for Plume-Surface Interactions in a Reduced Pressure Environment

Cited by 13 publications

References 9 publications

Instrument to Study Plume Surface Interactions (PSI) on the Lunar Surface: Science Motivation, Requirements, Instrument Overview, and Test Plans

Instrument to Study Plume Surface Interactions (PSI) on the Lunar Surface: Science Motivation, Requirements, Instrument Overview, and Test Plans

Lunar plume-surface interactions using rarefiedMultiphaseFoam

Millimeter-Wave Interferometry for Opaque Particle-Laden Flows

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