Search

A newly developed MHz rate imaging system that provides real-time flow visualization is described. The technique utilizes a custom-built Nd:YAG pulse burst laser and an ultra high-speed digital camera and is capable of capturing 17 images over 150 microseconds. The system was used to visualize a Mach 1.3 (M c =0.6) axisymmetric jet. Sample results indicate the potential of the technique to provide detailed information on the dynamic characteristics of large-scale structures. A two-dimensional cross-correlation technique was used to calculate the convective velocity of large-scale structures. Present results generally agree with the findings of earlier investigations that indicate a significant deviation of the convective velocity from theoretical predictions.

This article presents an experimental demonstration of a high-pressure unconditionally stable nonequilibrium molecular plasma sustained by a combination of a continuous wave CO laser and a sub-breakdown radio frequency (rf) electric field. The plasma is sustained in a CO/N2 mixture containing trace amounts of NO or O2 at pressures of P=0.4–1.2 atm. The initial ionization of the gases is produced by an associative ionization mechanism in collisions of two CO molecules excited to high vibrational levels by resonance absorption of the CO laser radiation with subsequent vibration-vibration (V-V) pumping. Further vibrational excitation of both CO and N2 is produced by free electrons heated by the applied rf field, which in turn produces additional ionization of these species by the associative ionization mechanism. In the present experiments, the reduced electric field, E/N, is sufficiently low to preclude field-induced electron impact ionization. Unconditional stability of the resultant cold molecular plasma ...

Spontaneous Raman scattering is used to experimentally determine the vibrational distribution functions of diatomic species in N2/CO and N2/CO/O2 gas mixtures optically pumped by a CO laser in the pressure range 410–760 torr. In N2/CO mixtures, as many as 38 vibrational levels of CO are observed, in addition to six levels of N2. The CO vibrational distribution function is highly non-Boltzmann, exhibiting the well-known Treanor plateau. In N2/CO/O2 mixtures, up to 13 vibrational levels of O2 are observed, which also exhibit a highly non-Boltzmann distribution. Experimental data are compared to predictions of a master equation kinetic model, which incorporates absorption of the laser radiation, species, and quantum state-specific vibration–vibration and vibration–translation energy exchange, as well as diffusion of vibrationally excited species out of the laser-excited volume. It is shown for the first time that modest power continuous wave lasers can be used to establish highly excited steady-state vibrati...

Absorption spectra from a mixture of 320 ppm CO2 in synthetic air (79% N2, 21% O2) were collected in the region from 3500 cm−1 to 4000 cm−1 under conditions in the range of 100–1000 atm and 295–900 K. At 295 K, both bands of the (1001), (0201) Fermi dyad show the collapse of P and R branches into a single nearly Lorentzian spectral feature as a result of interbranch line-mixing. At elevated temperatures, the presence of interbranch mixing is also clearly evident as is the presence of several hot bands. The experimental data are modeled using two methods for simulating line-mixed spectra; first, the usual line-by-line approach which relies on the binary impact approximation, and second, a simple band-averaged model proposed by Hartmann and L’Haridon [J. Chem. Phys. 103, 6467 (1995)]. The energy corrected sudden (ECS) approximation is used to generate the relaxation matrix in the first approach. Comparison with the measurement shows that the ECS method does not fit the high density data satisfactorily when ...

In many cases, the widely used matrix inversion approach to describe the spectral interference in collisionally perturbed molecular spectra is not feasible if the particular molecular interactions do not allow the sudden impact approximation (infinitely short collision duration). To overcome this problem, we present a time domain model that describes collisional broadening and narrowing phenomena without requiring the sudden approximation. The key element of the model is a Monte Carlo type sampling process to quantify the temporal autocorrelation of the molecular dipole moment. The spectrum is then obtained numerically via fast Fourier transform. The model does not require a frequency-dependent relaxation operator; the finite collision duration is simply an adjustable parameter in the time domain process. Our approach, which is generally applicable to any set of transition lines, is derived from concepts of both conventional quantum-mechanical and semiclassical theory of line interference. Coherent transf...

NO2 molecular tagging velocimetry (MTV) is demonstrated at repetition rates as high as 500 kHz in a laboratory scale Mach 5 wind tunnel. A pulse burst laser and a home built optical parametric oscillator system were used to simultaneously generate the required 355 and 226 nm wavelengths for NO2 photodissociation (tagging) and NO planar laser induced fluorescence imaging (interrogation), respectively. NO2 MTV images were obtained both in front and behind the characteristic bow shock from a 5 mm diameter cylinder. From Gaussian curve fitting, an average free stream flow velocity of 719 m/s was obtained. Absolute statistical precision in velocity of ∼11.5 m/s was determined, corresponding to relative precision of 1.6%–5%, depending upon the region of the flow probed.

Experiments were conducted to measure convective velocity of large-scale structures in the shear layer of a Mach 2.0 free jet with a convective Mach number of 0.87 and Reynolds number based on a nozzle diameter of 2.6×106. Real-time flow visualization and planar Doppler velocimetry (PDV) measurements along with space-time correlation were used. The results reveal that regardless of the measurement technique employed, whether qualitative flow visualization or quantitative PDV, the method of seeding can have a significant effect on the ability to accurately identify, track, and measure convective velocity of large-scale structures. This is apparent by the relatively large spread in convective velocity results obtained in the same jet by using various methods of seeding and qualitative and quantitative visualization. Convective velocity measurements made under the best seeding conditions available with PDV indicate a convective velocity of structures that is close to the value predicted by theory up to the c...

This letter discusses the effect of nitric oxide on gain and output power of a pulser-sustainer discharge excited oxygen iodine laser. Adding small amounts of NO to the laser mixture (a few hundreds of ppm) considerably increases gain and output power due to (i) O atom titration and resultant slower I* atom quenching and (ii) improved stability of the dc sustainer discharge, which allows stable operation at significantly higher discharge powers. Gain on the 1315nm iodine atom transition and laser power in the M=3 transverse laser cavity are 0.049%∕cm and 1.24W, at a flow temperature of T=100K.

A series of time resolved microwave attenuation measurements are performed of the electron number density of an electron beam generated, CO laser excited nonequilibrium O2∕N2 plasma. Resonant absorption of infrared radiation from the CO laser produces the nonequilibrium state, in which the heavy species vibrational modes are disproportionately excited, compared to the rotational and translational modes (Tvib≈2000–3000K vs TR∕T≈300K). It is shown that this results in an increase in the plasma free electron lifetime by two orders of magnitude compared to the unexcited cold gas, an effect which is ascribed to complete mitigation of rapid three-body electron attachment to molecular oxygen. A series of heavy species filtered pure rotational Raman scattering measurements are also presented, which exhibit minimal temperature change (+50K), indicating that the observed lifetime increase cannot be due to heavy-species thermal effects. Finally, computational modeling results infer an increase in the rate of O2− det...

This letter discusses operation of an electric discharge excited oxygen-iodine laser using a high-pressure, non-self-sustained pulser-sustainer discharge. Small signal gain on the 1315 nm iodine atom transition and the laser output power are measured in the M = 3 supersonic cavity downstream of the discharge section. In a 15% O 2 – 85 % He mixture, at a discharge pressure of 60 torr and discharge power of 1.5 kW , the highest gain measured in the M = 3 cavity is 0.022 % ∕ cm , at the flow temperature of T = 100 ± 10 K . At these conditions, the laser output power is 0.28 W .

This paper presents results of cold magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) flow deceleration experiments using repetitively pulsed, short pulse duration, high voltage discharge to produce ionization in M=3 nitrogen and air flows in the presence of transverse direct current electric field and transverse magnetic field. MHD effect on the flow is detected from the flow static pressure measurements. Retarding Lorentz force applied to the flow produces a static pressure increase of up to 17%–20%, while accelerating force of the same magnitude results in static pressure increase of up to 5%–7%. The measured static pressure changes are compared with modeling calculations using quasi-one-dimensional MHD flow equations. Comparison of the experimental results with the modeling calculations shows that the retarding Lorentz force increases the static pressure rise produced by Joule heating of the flow, while the accelerating Lorentz force reduces the pressure rise. The effect is produced for two possible combinations of the magne...

The paper presents results of magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) supersonic boundary layer control experiments using repetitively pulsed, short-pulse duration, high-voltage discharges in M=3 flows of nitrogen and air in the presence of a magnetic field of B=1.5T. We also have conducted boundary layer flow visualization experiments using laser sheet scattering. Flow visualization results show that as the Reynolds number increases, the boundary layer flow becomes much more chaotic, with the spatial scale of temperature fluctuations decreasing. Combined with density fluctuation spectra measurements using laser differential interferometry (LDI) diagnostics, this behavior suggests that boundary layer transition occurs at stagnation pressures of P0∼200–250Torr. A crossed discharge (pulser+dc sustainer) in M=3 flows of air and nitrogen produced a stable, diffuse, and uniform plasma, with the time-average dc current up to 1.0A in nitrogen and up to 0.8A in air. The electrical conductivity and the Hall parameter in these f...

A real-time flow visualization system that produces 17 images over a time span of 150 μs is used to visualize the mixing layers of Mach 1.3 (Mc=0.59) and Mach 2.0 (Mc=0.87) ideally expanded high Reynolds number axisymmetric jets. These image sequences reveal details about the influence of compressibility on the dynamics of turbulence structures. In general, the behavior observed in axisymmetric jets is similar to that observed in planar shear layers at similar convective Mach numbers. In addition, large streamwise vortices are apparent in cross-stream images of the flow. Large-scale structures become more three-dimensional and less organized with increasing compressibility and more difficult to identify and track. Planar space–time correlations are used to track structures as they convect downstream. The histogram of the convective velocity for the Mach 1.3 jet revealed a broad distribution of convective velocities with an ensemble average of 266 m/s, which is much higher than the theoretical prediction of 206 m/s. The Mach 2.0 jet, however, exhibited a bimodal convective velocity distribution with an ensemble average of 402 m/s for the “fast” and 190 m/s for the “slow” mode. These modes are equally spaced from the theoretical convective velocity of 303 m/s. Approximately 2/3 of the measured velocities were in the slow mode.

High resolution depolarized Rayleigh spectra of nitrobenzene in CCl4 have been measured at several concentrations and temperatures. All spectra display a shear wave dip at the zero frequency. They are found to fit well to the form of a two‐variable theory in the low frequency regions studied. The various parameters such as the collective molecular reorientation rate Γ, the shear wave relaxation rate q2νs, and the dynamic coupling coefficient R are obtained as a function of temperature and concentration. While the R value is found to be independent of temperature, it changes significantly with the nitrobenzene concentration. Moreover, the R value for pure nitrobenzene is found to be greater than 0.5, higher than any reported previously for a low viscosity liquid. The τRay values are found to follow the classical Stokes–Einstein relation, with zero intercept. The pair orientational correlation affects the Rayleigh relaxation time.

An extensive Rayleigh–Brillouin scattering study of polystyrene and cyclohexane mixtures at various temperatures and polymer concentrations has been carried out. The experimental results have been analyzed in terms of the equations of generalized hydrodynamics developed recently by Lin and Wang. Over the entire concentration range, the temperature dependence of the Brillouin frequency and linewidth data can be satisfactorily interpreted in terms of the equations in the recent theory. The pronounced effects of the Brillouin data have been related to a quantity, referred to as the effective structural relaxation time τs for the mixture. The use of the single relaxation time model is justified for Brillouin scattering. It has been found that τs is not significantly affected by the presense of polymer molecules at low polymer concentration, but it increases rapidly with increasing polymer concentration at high concentration. At low polymer concentration, the relaxation frequency τs−1 is fast compared with the...