Elaboration of collisional-radiative models applied to Earth and Mars entry problems

Abstract

Three Collisional-Radiative (CR) models are elaborated and tested in typical atmospheric entry conditions. The first CR model (CoRaM-AIR) is dedicated to the Earth atmospheric entry and is based on an electronically and vibrationally specific state-to-state description of N2-O2-Ar mixtures. The second CR model (CoRaM-MARS) is dedicated to the Mars atmospheric entry and treats the CO2-N2-Ar mixtures with a similar vibrationally and electronically specific approach. Since their implementation in a Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) code has not yet been performed, they are implemented in a 0D code giving the evolution in time of the excited states number density in constant pressure and temperature conditions similar to trajectory points at lower altitude. Nevertheless, such an implementation in a CFD code has been performed for a third CR model, specifically devoted to pure nitrogen flows (CoRaM-N2). The results show that the equilibrium is reached relatively slowly. In addition, the influence of radiation on the chemistry is weak.