Nonequilibrium radiation behind a strong shock wave in CO2-N2

This work presents experiments reproducing plasma re-entry for one trajectory point of a Martian mission. The typical facility to investigate such hypersonic flow is shock tube; here we used the free-piston shock tube TCM2. Measurements of radiative flux behind the shock wave are realized thanks to time-resolved emission spectroscopy which is calibrated in intensity. As CN violet system is the main radiator in near UV-visible range, we have focused our study on its spectrum. Moreover a physical model, based on a multi-temperature kinetic code and a radiative code, for calculation of non equilibrium radiation behind a shock wave is developed for CO2-N-2-Ar mixtures. Comparisons between experiments and calculations show that standard kinetic models (Park, McKenzie) are inefficient to reproduce our experimental results. Therefore we propose new rate coefficients in particular for the dissociation of CO2, showing the way towards a better description of the chemistry of the mixture. (C) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.