Doctoral Dissertations

Keywords and Phrases

Immersed finite element; Lunar dust charging; Lunar plasma environment; Particle in cell; Plasma charging; Plasma material interaction

Abstract

"Due to the recent relevance of NASA’s focus on lunar missions, a better understanding of the lunar plasma-surface-dust environment is vital for their success. The lunar surface, devoid of an atmosphere and a global magnetic field, is directly exposed to solar radiation and solar wind plasma. This exposure leads to the electrical charging of the lunar surface due to the bombardment of solar wind plasma and the emission/collection of photoelectrons. Therefore, this research developed accurate and efficient computational models of plasma-surface-dust interactions and extend a legacy simulation code, namely the Immersed-Finite-Element Particle-in-Cell (IFE-PIC), to a parallel version: Parallel Immersed-Finite-Element Particle-in-Cell (PIFE-PIC) for charging problems with arbitrary geometries of lunar surface and dust charging.

The PIFE-PIC simulations underwent validation through electrostatic field and plasma dynamic problems, incorporating analytical solutions for comparative analysis with numerical results. Following this, a comprehensive strong and weak scaling parallel efficiency analysis was conducted for the PIFE-PIC framework. Finally, the code package was applied to scientific and engineering applications of plasma-surface-dust interactions, specifically, for lunar craters and individual dust particles. Fully kinetic numerical simulations were conducted to investigate plasma charging at lunar craters, some of which included lunar lander modules. The charge collection over time for dust grains was explored, considering variations in size, irregularity, the number of grains in the domain, spacing between dust grains, and permittivity. The reported results contribute to addressing a fundamental question in dusty plasma: determining the net amount of charge and distribution on each individual dust grain. In these simulations, the net charge ratio (Qd / e) is on the order of approximately 104" -- Abstract, p. iii

Advisor(s)

Han, Daoru Frank

Committee Member(s)

He, Xiaoming
Hosder, Serhat
Isaac, Kakkattukuzhy M.
Pernick, Henry J.

Department(s)

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

Degree Name

Ph. D. in Aerospace Engineering

Publisher

Missouri University of Science and Technology

Publication Date

Summer 2024

Pagination

xxi, 157 pages

Note about bibliography

Includes_bibliographical_references_(pages 142-156)

Rights

©2024 David Clifford Lund , All Rights Reserved

Document Type

Dissertation - Open Access

File Type

text

Language

English

Thesis Number

T 12396

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