Abstract

Experimental results on the explosive breakup of water aerosols in response to high-energy CO₂ laser radiation are presented for optical size parameters ranging from 6 to 15. The maximum power density used in this work was ~1.5 MW/cm². A pulsed N₂ laser imaging system coupled to a digital image processing system was used to observe visually the behavior of the drops on breakup. A phase/Doppler particle analyzer system was used to determine the simultaneous size and velocity of expelled particles at a distance of 2 mm from the drops. Results indicate that the incident irradiance affects the average size of particles expelled, but the average velocity of the expelled particles is not a strong function of the incident irradiance. Drop explosions resembling jellyfish are reported, we believe, for the first time in this work.

© 1987 Optical Society of America

Explosive vaporization of a large transparent droplet irradiated by a high intensity laser

Jian-Zhi Zhang, Joseph K. Lam, Carol F. Wood, Boa-Teh Chu, and Richard K. Chang
Appl. Opt. 26(22) 4731-4737 (1987)

Micron-sized droplets irradiated with a pulsed CO₂ laser: measurement of explosion and breakdown thresholds

Ronald G. Pinnick, Abhijit Biswas, Robert L. Armstrong, S. Gerard Jennings, J. David Pendleton, and Gilbert Fernández
Appl. Opt. 29(7) 918-925 (1990)

Water droplets irradiated by a pulsed CO₂ laser: comparison of computed temperature contours with explosive vaporization patterns

J. D. Pendleton
Appl. Opt. 24(11) 1631-1637 (1985)

Peculiarities of light scattering by droplet aerosol in a divergent CO₂ laser beam

O. A. Volkovitsky
Appl. Opt. 26(24) 5307-5310 (1987)

Time-resolved shadowgraphs of large individual water and ethanol droplets vaporized by a pulsed CO₂ laser

Carol F. Wood, David H. Leach, Jian-Zhi Zhang, Richard K. Chang, and Peter W. Barber
Appl. Opt. 27(11) 2279-2286 (1988)