Gas Dynamics in Extreme Environments: From the Columbia Accident Investigation to Micro Devices
Dr. Michael Gallis Sandia National Laboratory
Fri Jan 23, 02-03:00pm, 3-270
No enrollment limit, no advance sign up
Single session event
The loss of the Space Shuttle Columbia was followed by a six-month investigation covering numerous failure scenarios. Due to the lack of physical data numerical simulations were used to help with the interpretation of the forensic evidence and the evaluation of the plausibility of the candidate scenarios. In this talk the contribution of high altitude aerodynamic and thermal loads to the failure scenario will be demonstrated through molecular gas dynamics calculations. These simulations cover a regime where traditional CFD fails and the experimental study of the phenomena is impossible.
The use of molecular gas dynamics simulations will also be demonstrated for design applications ranging from spacecraft to micro-machines.
Contact: Daniel Shea, 1-106, 258-5804, gumby@mit.edu
Sponsor: Mechanical Engineering
Latest update: 14-Jan-2004
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