Numerical and experimental studies of laser propulsion toward micro-airplane

摘要

Laser supported propulsion of multi-layered target is investigated by the CIP-CUP (Cubic-Interpolated Pseudoparticle Combined Unified Procedure) based hydrodynamic code PARCIPHAL and experiments by pendulum and semiconductor load cell. The momentum coupling efficiency of 5000 [N.s/MJ] has been achieved by ORION experiments that agree with the simulation code. Time evolution of ablation process and subsequent acceleration is investigated by load cell experiment and simulation. The double-layered target that consists of transparent tamper (Exotic Target) shows higher acceleration rate even with small laser. A propulsion concept is proposed to drive and control a micro-airplane that can be used for observation of climate and volcanic eruption where no one can access directly. In this concept, it is necessary to irradiate a micro-airplane repetitively. Therefore the double-layered target attached a liquid overlay is useful because the device that supplies the surface with liquid can be simple and light. In this paper, the simple device using water as an overlay is presented. Furthermore, from the results of experiments and simulation, it is clear that the mechanism of ablation process differs between the target attached a water layer and the target attached a solid layer.