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Active/Plasma
Stealth Technology
Explanation
of what is Plasma Stealth Technology and how it works (-by
Venik)
| Plasma
- links to
plasma physics sites.
Couple of things to keep in mind: plasma is ionized gas particles.
Therefore, plasma flow is a flow of ionized gas particles. Ion is an
electrically charged particle or group of atoms. Plasma cloud is a
quasineutral (total electrical charge is zero) collection of free charged
particles. The vast majority of matter in the universe exists in plasma
state. Near the Earth plasma can be found in the form of solar wind,
magnetosphere and ionosphere. The main property of plasma (for our
purposes) is its frequency, which is equal to a square root of a ratio of
4 * Pi * square of ion charge * concentration of ions to the mass of ion:
SQRT (
(4 * Pi * n * e^2) / m ),
where e
is electron or ion charge, n is concentration of ions per volume of plasma
and m is mass of ion.
There are several types of oscillations in plasma: low frequency
(ion-sound waves), high frequency (oscillations of electrons relative to
ions), spiral waves (in the presence of a magnetic field - "magnetosound"),
and cross waves propagating along a magnetic field. A device for
generating plasma is called plasmatron. This device generates the
so-called low-temperature plasma. A brief
guide to plasmas (recommended before you proceed with this page.) |
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Jane's:
Russians
offer radical stealth device for export
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Russian Academy of Sciences |
Russian Academy of
Sciences recently revealed information about a novel
"stealth" technology, that incorporates plasma fields. Russian
ITAR/TASS news agency recently interviewed the director of the Keldysh
Research Center (FKA Scientific Research Institute for Thermal Processes),
Academician Anatoliy Koroteyev, who briefly summarized capabilities of
plasma stealth system developed by his research center and the current
status of the project. You can read the entire ITAR/TASS article in Russian
or in English
(external link.) An interesting fact: Keldysh Research Center
operates a unique plasma wind tunnel for analyzing propagation of
electromagnetic waves in the vicinity of a spacecraft as well as for
testing of antenna inserts and ion thrusters. Detailed info about Keldysh
Research Center here. |
Laser plasma laboratory |
First, I would like to assure people with high
school physics background that, at least in theory, the system, described
by Academician Koroteyev, is perfectly valid. Interactions between various
types of electromagnetic radiation and plasma fields were studied for many
years in Russia, the United States and around the world. Among recent
achievement in this area is a "plasma stealth" antenna developed
by the US Navy for use on LO aircraft. The system employs a U-shaped glass
tube filled with low-pressure gas (something like a fluorescent tube).
This antenna is energized and acts as a highly-directional, electronically
steered transmitter/receiver. When de-energized, the antenna is virtually
transparent to hostile electromagnetic signals. One of the problems with
such a system is its vulnerability to resonant signals. For more
information click here.
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Microwave plasma discharge
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The system developed by the Russians is also
based on electromagnetic wave-plasma interactions, but in a very different
way. Russian stealth plasma device creates a plasma field around an
aircraft. This field partially consumes electromagnetic energy of a
hostile radar or causes it to bend around the aircraft, reducing the
aircraft RCS by up to 100 times. Sounds fantastic? Not really: effects of
dissipation and bending of electromagnetic signals in presence of plasma
field have been observed for decades. If there is anything new about the
system developed by the Russians it certainly is not the theoretical part
but technical aspects of the plasma generator. Keldysh Research Center
claims to have developed, built and tested a plasma shield generator that
weighs only 100 kg.
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Microwave-induced plasma "air spike" |
The idea of creating a plasma field around an
aircraft is not a new one either. Such a possibility was thoroughly
studied by both Russians and Americans. This was done for very different
reasons, however. Aircraft designers want to use a plasma shield generator
on hypersonic aircraft. In this application, plasma may be generated by a
powerful plasma laser and will act as a heat shield for an aircraft. There
are plans to use such a system in conjunction with a magnetohydrodynamic (MHD)
propulsion to achieve velocities up to Mach 50. For more information click
here or here.
This is truly unbelievable, but even this theoretically and
technologically is perfectly possible. It is not known whether the plasma
stealth system developed by the Russians employs a plasma laser or some
other method for creating a plasma field. My personal opinion is that it
has nothing to do with a plasma laser (which is a very large and very
power-hungry device.)
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Deep Space 1 satellite
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Plasma physics was given priority in Russia many
years ago, which resulted in a number of breakthroughs in theory as well
as practical applications of plasma. Perhaps one of the most interesting
and promising applications of plasma is the so-called ion thruster,
used to propel spacecraft. This technology was first developed in Russia
(mainly by Keldysh Research Center) and recently successfully used on an
American satellite Deep Space 1.
The system uses xenon gas as fuel and can achieve exhaust velocities of up
to 30 km/sec (ten times that of an average rocket engine.) Wouldn't you
like to understand how this ion drive really works? You go back to college
or follow this link to
MSNBC excellent interactive "Ion Drive" guide. Interesting to
note that first such "ion thrusters" were developed in USSR and
used on Soviet spacecraft almost 30 years ago.
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LINKS
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Stealth Page
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