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An optically powered fireset has been developed for the Procyon high explosive pulsed-power generator at Los Alamos National Laboratory. The fireset was located inside this flux compression experiment where large magnetic fields are generated. No energy sources were allowed inside the experiment and no wire connections can penetrate through the wall, of the experiment because of the high magnetic fields. The flux compression was achieved with high explosives in the experiment. The fireset was used to remotely charge a 1.2?f capacitor to 6,500V and to provide a readout of the voltage on the capacitor at the control room. The capacitor was charged by using two 7W fiber coupled GaAlAs laser diodes to illuminate two fiber coupled 12V solar cells. The solar cell outputs were connected in parallel to the input of a DC-DC converter which step up a 12V to 6,500V. A voltmeter, powered by illuminating a third 12V solar cell with 1W laser diode, was used to monitor the charge on the capacitor. The voltage was measured with a divider circuit, then converted to frequency in a V-F converter and transmitted to the control room over a fiber optic link. A fiducial circuit measured the capacitor firing current and provided an optical output timing pulse.
Procyon is a two-stage explosive pulsed-power system, consisting of a MK-IX helical generator and an explosively formed fuse (EFF) opening switch. A complete assembly including load and diagnostics is shown. The system was originally developed for the purpose of powering plasma z-pinch experiments and, in its original concept, was coupled to the plasma z-pinch load through a third pulsed power stage, a plasma flow switch (PFS). The authors have performed plasma z-pinch experiments both with and without a PFS, and they have now conducted the first heavy liner experiment. In this paper, they will summarize the results obtained to date with the system, and briefly discuss future applications.
Lists citations with abstracts for aerospace related reports obtained from world wide sources and announces documents that have recently been entered into the NASA Scientific and Technical Information Database.
The technology of the next few decades could possibly allow us to explore with robotic probes the closest stars outside our Solar System, and maybe even observe some of the recently discovered planets circling these stars. This book looks at the reasons for exploring our stellar neighbors and at the technologies we are developing to build space probes that can traverse the enormous distances between the stars. In order to reach the nearest stars, we must first develop a propulsion technology that would take our robotic probes there in a reasonable time. Such propulsion technology has radically different requirements from conventional chemical rockets, because of the enormous distances that must be crossed. Surprisingly, many propulsion schemes for interstellar travel have been suggested and await only practical engineering solutions and the political will to make them a reality. This is a result of the tremendous advances in astrophysics that have been made in recent decades and the perseverance and imagination of tenacious theoretical physicists. This book explores these different propulsion schemes – all based on current physics – and the challenges they present to physicists, engineers, and space exploration entrepreneurs. This book will be helpful to anyone who really wants to understand the principles behind and likely future course of interstellar travel and who wants to recognizes the distinctions between pure fantasy (such as Star Trek’s ‘warp drive’) and methods that are grounded in real physics and offer practical technological solutions for exploring the stars in the decades to come.
This is a completely updated and revised version of a monograph published in 2002 by the NASA History Office under the original title Deep Space Chronicle: A Chronology of Deep Space and Planetary Probes, 1958-2000. This new edition not only adds all events in robotic deep space exploration after 2000 and up to the end of 2016, but it also completely corrects and updates all accounts of missions from 1958 to 2000--Provided by publisher.