McGill University

Published purpose

This project entitled « Sounding Rocket Flight to Explore Percolating Reactive Waves » will utilize a European sounding rocket (MAXUS 9) to examine reactive waves propagating through suspension of particles. The project aims to transfer expertise developed at McGill University in flame propagation in a suspensions to a space-rated flight experiment, including the development of novel techniques and diagnostics for creating and characterizing particulate suspensions in microgravity. Upon successful completion of the flight in 2016, the experimental data generated will be analyzed and modeled The project will utilize the PerWaves experiment that will fly on MAXUS 9 to demonstrate unambiguously, for the first time, the existence of a reactive wave propagation regime that is controlled by the discreteness of the reactive media. It is anticipated that the new technology that is developed to address these challenges will find wider application because the creation of well-characterized dust suspensions and diagnostic tools to quantify concentration and uniformity of dust in terrestrial and space-based environments is a general problem that the new capabilities deriving from this project will be able to address.