Effect of Dust and Hot Spots on the Thermal Stability of Laser Sails.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 37499230.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1021/acs.nanolett.3c01069 and PMC identifier 10416348.
- Licence recorded as CC BY-NC-ND.
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Abstract
Laser sails propelled by gigawatt-scale ground-based laser arrays have the potential to reach relativistic speeds, traversing the solar system in hours and reaching nearby stars in years. Here, we describe the danger interplanetary dust poses to the survival of a laser sail during its acceleration phase. We show through multiphysics simulations how localized heating from a single optically absorbing dust particle on the sail can initiate a thermal runaway process that rapidly spreads and destroys the entire sail. We explore potential mitigation strategies, including increasing the in-plane thermal conductivity of the sail to reduce the peak temperature at hot spots and isolating the absorptive regions of the sail that can burn away individually.