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In‐situ mass spectrometric observation of impact vaporization of water‐ice at low temperatures
Author(s) -
Sugi N.,
Arakawa M.,
Kouchi A.,
Maeno N.
Publication year - 1998
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/98gl00406
Subject(s) - vaporization , projectile , materials science , impact energy , thermodynamics , composite material , physics , metallurgy
Impact experiments on water ice targets were carried out to investigate the partitioning of energy and the mass of water vaporized. A copper projectile accelerated by an electromagnetic gun impacted a low‐temperature ice target under a high vacuum condition. The mass of vaporized water gas was measured as a function of impact velocity (54–329 m/s) and ice temperature (130–185 K). Some 0.01–0.03 % of the impact energy is partitioned into ice vaporization at velocities ≤ 100 m/s. For impacts in the 100–180 m/s range, the energy partitioned into water vaporization drastically increases to 18–26 % of the impact energy. The estimated shock pressure is 277 MPa for a copper‐ice impact at 100 m/s. This is close to the pressure at the Hugoniot elastic limit for ice. It is considered that the drastic change in energy partition at 100 m/s is due to the large increases in surface area and localized heating via shear banding occurring at the Hugoniot elastic limit.