Numerical investigation of the nonreacting and reacting flow fields in a transverse gaseous injection channel with different species

The mixing and combustion process has an important impact on the engineering realization of the scramjet engine. The nonreacting and reacting flow fields in a transverse injection channel have been investigated numerically, and the predicted results have been compared with the available experimental data in the open literature, the wall pressure distributions, the separation length, as well as the penetration height. Further, the influences of the molecular weight of the fuel and the jet-to-crossflow pressure ratio on the wall pressure distribution have been studied. The obtained results show that the predicted results show reasonable agreement with the experimental data, and the variable trends of the penetration height and the separation distance are almost the same as those obtained in the experiment. The vapor pressure model is suitable to fit the relationship between the penetration height, the separation distance and the jet-to-crossflow pressure ratio. The combustion process mainly occurs upstream of the injection port, and it makes a great difference to the wall pressure distribution upstream of the injection port, especially when the jet-to-crossflow pressure ratio is large enough, namely 17.72 and 25.15 in the range considered in the current study. For hydrogen, the combustion downstream of the injection port occurs more intensively, and this may be induced by its smaller molecular weight.     

Dawn′s exploration of Vesta

On 16 July 2011, after completing nearly four years of interplanetary flight, Dawn entered orbit around (4) Vesta, the second most massive body in the main asteroid belt. Dawn used solar electric propulsion to spiral to six different orbits to accomplish its science campaign. Although the transfers to progressively lower orbits presented significant challenges, all were executed smoothly. During its nearly 14 months in orbit, Dawn spiraled down to 210 km above the surface and back up before initiating the gradual departure to travel to dwarf planet (1) Ceres for a 2015 rendezvous. Dawn′s exploration of Vesta has shown it to be geologically complex and fascinating, resembling terrestrial planets more than typical asteroids. Among the principal features is a 500-km-diameter impact basin within which is the second tallest mountain known in the solar system. This paper presents Dawn′s operations at Vesta and summarizes the principal findings.     

Novel orbits of Mercury,Venus and Mars enabled using low-thrust propulsion

Exploration of the inner planets of the Solar System is vital to significantly enhance the understanding of the formulation of the Earth and other planets. This paper therefore considers the development of novel orbits of Mars, Mercury and Venus to enhance the opportunities for remote sensing of these planets. Continuous acceleration is used to extend the critical inclination of highly elliptical orbits at each planet and is shown to require modest thrust magnitudes. This paper also presents the extension of existing sun-synchronous orbits around Mars. However, unlike Earth and Mars, natural sun-synchronous orbits do not exist at Mercury or Venus. This research therefore also uses continuous acceleration to enable circular and elliptical sun-synchronous orbits, by ensuring that the orbit's nodal precession rate matches the planets mean orbital rate around the Sun, such that the lighting along the ground-track remains approximately constant over the mission duration. This property is useful both in terms of spacecraft design, due to the constant thermal conditions, and for comparison of images. Considerably high thrust levels are however required to enable these orbits, which are prohibitively high for orbits with inclinations around 90°. These orbits therefore require some development in electric propulsion systems before becoming feasible.     

霍尔推力器羽流对S波段电磁波的衰减研究

霍尔推力器羽流对S波段电磁波信号有衰减作用,这对星上推力器与天线的布置策略有重要影响。为研究S波段电磁波的衰减程度,建立几何光路算法,对电磁波在等离子体羽流媒质中的传输衰减进行数值描述,并以试验所测的信噪比数据来验证算法精度。验证试验采用空间透射波法,在相同工况的试验与计算结果对比中,最大计算误差为26.1%,平均误差为7.3%;在趋势上,试验结果与计算结果保持一致。在此基础上,针对84个在轨典型工况进行S波段电磁波信噪比衰减计算,结果显示：羽流对电磁波的吸收作用是影响衰减的主要因素,衰减最大区域出现在天线位置0.3～0.6m、方向角15°～30°的区域,衰减值在-7~-4dB之间。该结果可为霍尔推力器与天线在卫星的布置提供参考依据。     

折射式二次聚光太阳能热推力器性能预示

针对折射式二次聚光太阳能热推力器,给出了太阳能热推力器(STP)性能预示的工程算法。计算结果表明,以氢气为工质,STP具有比冲较高(7500N·s/kg),推力范围宽(0.6～50N)的特点,并分析了聚光器的聚光比、太阳辐射能通量密度和工质气体的流量对STP性能的影响,得出了参数间的变化关系,为STP设计参数的选取和进一步研究提供了重要参考。     

基于面元法的分布式涵道推进系统进气道优化设计

分布式涵道推进系统被认为是一种高效率的动力布局形式,其中进气道如何使气流低损失地快速过渡到数个圆形截面的涵道风扇进口是一个亟需探索的设计问题。以分布式涵道推进系统进气道过渡段为研究对象,基于面元计算方法,发展了一种进气道内流动的快速数值预测手段。应用所发展面元法数值方法结合进气道的超椭圆参数化方法、自适应优化算法建立了分布式涵道推进系统进气道的无经验优化设计方法。以某型悬停状态的分布式涵道推进垂直起降飞行器为例,使用该设计方法实现了从无圆滑过渡的简单初始几何到气动指标符合优化预期的光顺几何的优化设计。基于RANS的三维数值分析表明：所优化设计的进气道相比于初始几何总压畸变系数(DC)从0.0086降低到0.0067,低于基于经验设计的参考几何（DC=0.0073）,且流场无明显分离及旋涡,确认了这种具有高时间效率的无经验设计方法的有效性。     

阴阳极进气量对附加场磁等离子体推力器性能的影响

针对附加场磁等离子体推力器阴阳极供气量对推力器性能的影响进行了研究。采用试验方法测量了稳态AF MPDT的束流参数以及放电电压、放电电流、附加磁感应强度等工况参数,测量计算了推力、效率等性能参数。通过改变阴阳极供气比例,分析研究了初始气体分布对推力器性能及物理机制的影响。研究结果显示,阴极供气比重增大时,推力器推力及效率相应增大,但增大到一定比例,推力器出现工作不稳定导致性能下降,说明阴阳极存在最佳的供气比例,表明供气比例对推力器性能具有重要影响。     

Experimental characteristics of a two-electrode plasma synthetic jet actuator array in serial

Plasma Synthetic Jet (PSJ) actuators have shown wide and promising application prospects in high-speed flow control, due to their advantages including high exhaust speed, wide frequency band, rapid response, and non-moving components. Although previous studies on PSJ actuators are abundant, most of them have focused on the performance of a single actuator. However, in practice, an actuator array is very necessary for large-scale aerodynamic actuation on account of the small affected area of a single PSJ. In this paper, the characteristics of a two-electrode plasma synthetic jet actuator array in serial are investigated experimentally. Compared to a parallel actuator array, the serial actuator array requires simpler power supply design and is much easier to realize. High-speed photography of the discharge evolution, voltage-current measurement, and shadowgraphy visualization are used in the investigation. Experimental results show that, for the serial actuator array, weak discharges happen firstly between energized and suspending electrodes, and then a strong pulse arc discharge is triggered. The breakdown voltage in serial is irrelevant to such factors as the number of actuators, the maximum or minimum gap in serial, the connection sequence, etc. It is mainly determined by the sum of gaps. For serial actuators with the same anode-to-cathode spacing, the energy deposition is the same, and the jet is synchronous and similar. Because of the entrainment and merging of adjacent jet vortices, the jet front speed of an aligned synchronous jet array increases as the orifice distance decreases. To achieve the highest jet front velocity, the orifice of the actuator has an optimal diameter.     

电负性气体等离子体推力器研究进展

目前广泛应用的电推力器中,大多采用加速单一正离子的方式来获得推力和相应比冲。该加速方式需要增设中和器,对喷射出的正离子进行中和以保持羽流电中性,否则将导致航天器自充电,对其通信和电子器件造成损害,并减弱加速场。为了简化系统结构,延长推力器寿命,提出了一种能够交替加速正、负离子来获得推力的电负性气体等离子体推力器。分析了该推力器的工作原理和加速过程,指明了包括电负性气体种类选取、电子过滤装置设计要求、如何施加周期性栅极偏置电压加速正、负离子以及合理诊断离子数密度等关键技术,为后续研究工作提供了参考。     

离子推力器羽流热效应仿真分析

离子推力器工作时向外喷出的羽流与航天器表面碰撞,会引起敏感材料热变形等热效应,严重时会导致航天任务失败。针对兰州空间技术物理研究所研制的LIPS-200型离子推力器羽流热效应进行了仿真分析。仿真中,使用粒子网格（PIC）方法处理等离子体运动,使用直接模拟蒙特卡罗（DSMC）方法处理粒子间碰撞,使用Maxwell模型处理粒子与壁面的能量交换,对电推进羽流热效应测量中的部分测点进行了数值模拟。结果表明,仿真结果与实验数据符合较好,离子推力器出口轴线上滞止热流仿真值与实验测量值误差小于17.0%。此外,热流计对流场的影响主要集中在热流计附近0.1 m范围内,对整体流场影响较小。