Engineering Commons^™

Silicon Carbide Fabric Catalysis Assessment In An Inductively Coupled Plasma Facility, Christopher Michael Nolan

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Flexible thermal protection systems (FTPS) are being considered as they allow for atmospheric reentry of larger payloads. Current rigid aeroshells struggle to achieve this as they are limited by the shroud of the rocket being used. One promising material candidate for these flexible heat shields is a Hi-Nicalon silicon carbide (SiC) fabric. By utilizing the UVM 30 kW Inductively Coupled Plasma Facility, an array of experiments were performed to explore the chemical response to plasma in a variety of atmospheric conditions. The main goal of this thesis is to better understand gas surface interactions, mainly through two-photon laser-induced fluorescence (TALIF) …