Shock tube experiments are carried out to study the physical and chemical processes during a vehicle entry into the Mars atmosphere using optical emission spectroscopy (OES) and tunable diode laser absorption spectroscopy (TDLAS). Gas temperature and CO concentration distribution are diagnosed behind a shock wave in a CO₂-N₂ mixture with two different conditions of initial pressure and velocity. The strong shock wave is established in a shock tube driven by combustion of hydrogen and oxygen. Time-resolved spectra of the Δv = 0 sequence of the B²Σ+→X²Σ+ electronic transition of CN have been observed through OES. A precise analysis of the CN violet spectra is performed and used to determine rotational and vibrational temperatures. Two absorption lines in the first overtone band of CO near 2.33 μm, are selected from a HITRAN simulation to calibrate laser wavelength and detect the CO concentration. Combined with these temperature results using OES, CO concentrations in the thermal equilibrium region are derived, which are 2.91 × 10¹² cm^-3 and 1.01 × 10¹³ cm^-3, corresponding to equilibrium temperatures equal to 7000 ± 400 K and 6000 ± 300 K in low and high pressure conditions, respectively.

Date Published: 4 May 2015
PDF: 9 pages
Proc. SPIE 9543, Third International Symposium on Laser Interaction with Matter, 954314 (4 May 2015); doi: 10.1117/12.2180592

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 9543:
Third International Symposium on Laser Interaction with Matter
Yury M. Andreev; Zunqi Lin III; Xiaowu Ni; Xisheng Ye, Editor(s)