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An improved equation of state for air plasma simulations

Accepted version
Peer-reviewed

Type

Article

Change log

Abstract

jats:pThis work is concerned with the development of a novel, accurate equation of state for describing partially ionized air plasma in local thermodynamic equilibrium. One key application for this new equation of state is the simulation of lightning strike on aircraft. Due to the complexities of species ionization and interaction, although phenomenological curve fitting of thermodynamic properties is possible, these curves are intractable for practical numerical simulation. The large difference in size of the parameters (many orders of magnitude) and complexity of the equations means they are not straightforward to invert for conversion between thermodynamic variables. The approach of this paper is to take an accurate 19-species phenomenological model and use this to generate a tabulated dataset. Coupled with a suitable interpolation procedure, this offers an accurate and computationally efficient technique for simulating partially ionized air plasma. The equation of state is implemented within a multiphysics methodology which can solve for two-way coupling between a plasma arc and an elastoplastic material substrate. The implementation is validated against experimental results, both for a single material plasma and an arc coupled to a substrate. It is demonstrated that accurate, oscillation-free thermodynamic profiles can be obtained, with good results even close to material surfaces.</jats:p>

Description

Keywords

51 Physical Sciences

Journal Title

Physics of Fluids

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

1070-6631
1089-7666

Volume Title

33

Publisher

AIP Publishing

Rights

All rights reserved