Doctoral Dissertations

Keywords and Phrases

Biogenic oils; Methyl soyate

Abstract

"The objective of research presented in this dissertation was to develop a readily deployable and environmentally benign obscurant system operating with a single liquid for the visible and near infrared regions. To achieve this objective, research efforts were directed in two areas: i. Evaluating suitable biogenic oils to replace the United States Army's "Fog Oil" as the obscurant fluid. ii. Design, fabrication and validation of a prototype man-portable / vehicle mountable modular obscurant aerosol generator. Petroleum middle distillate - "Fog Oil" has been the material of choice for wide area obscuration for several decades. Large quantities (thousands gallons) of the oil have been released into the environment during a single obscurant training exercise, posing potential risks to human health and the environment. Therefore, it is desirable to find a suitable replacement which is benign to humans and the environment. However, the oil must possess physical characteristics required for obtaining a desired obscurant plume. Various monoesters of biogenic oils were evaluated, methyl esters of soybean oil were found to be the most suitable oil from the availability, cost and performance points of views. The current wide area obscurant generator in US Army's inventory is M-56, a large generator mounted on a dedicated vehicle. This generator suffers from logistic and portability limitations. The smaller man-portable generator designed and fabricated as part of this dissertation overcame limitations of M-56 while delivering same obscuration capabilities in the visible region and enhanced capability in the near infrared (NIR) region"--Abstract, page iii.

Advisor(s)

Kapila, Shubhender

Committee Member(s)

Nam, Paul Ki-souk
Reddy, Prakash
Whitefield, Philip D.
Flanigan, V. J.

Department(s)

Chemistry

Degree Name

Ph. D. in Chemistry

Sponsor(s)

Edgewood Chemical Biological Center
United States. Department of the Army

Publisher

Missouri University of Science and Technology

Publication Date

2011

Pagination

xv, 194 pages

Note about bibliography

Includes bibliographical references (pages 192-193).

Rights

© 2011 Robert William Schaub, All rights reserved.

Document Type

Dissertation - Open Access

File Type

text

Language

English

Subject Headings

Smoke screensSmoke screens -- Environmental aspects

Thesis Number

T 10174

Print OCLC #

858869259

Electronic OCLC #

858869924

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