Engineering Papers⌕ Search

Engineering topics

Kalita, Armin

Publications and source records attributed to Kalita, Armin.

Rocket drops: The self-propulsion of supercooled freezing drops

Isolated supercooled water drops have been observed to move spontaneously while freezing in vacuum. This motion is caused by an increase of the evaporation rate during the early stages of freezing, which transfers momentum to the drops, similar to rocket propulsion. As in other cases of self-propulsion, symmetry-breaking is necessary, and occurs when ice nucleation occurs away from the center of the drop. The self-propulsion velocity was modeled analytically for a simplified case, and numerically for two experiments. Here, the model predicts peak velocities on the order of 1 m/s in vacuum, and a drop kinematics similar to that observed experimentally. In air, the self-propulsion velocity is expected to be much smaller but may be detectable for micron-sized drops.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

The Magnitude and Waveform of Shock Waves Induced by X-ray Lasers in Water

The high energy densities deposited in materials by focused X-ray laser pulses generate shock waves which travel away from the irradiated region, and can generate complex wave patterns or induce phase changes. We determined the time-pressure histories of shocks induced by X-ray laser pulses in liquid water microdrops, by measuring the surface velocity of the microdrops from images recorded during the reflection of the shock at the surface. Measurements were made with ~30 µm diameter droplets using 10 keV X-rays, for X-ray pulse energies that deposited linear energy densities from 3.5 to 120 mJ/m; measurements were also made with ~60 µm diameter drops for a narrower energy range. At a distance of 15 µm from the X-ray beam, the peak shock pressures ranged from 44 to 472 MPa, and the corresponding time-pressure histories of the shocks had a fast quasi-exponential decay with positive pressure durations estimated to range from 2 to 5 ns. Knowledge of the amplitude and waveform of the shock waves enables accurate modeling of shock propagation and experiment designs that either maximize or minimize the effect of shocks.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗