Laser-Induced Breakdown and Detonation in Particle-Laden Systems

Simulation of the interaction of a laser pulse with gas-droplet and gas-particle mixtures plays an important role in environmental and engineering applications. The injection of liquid droplets or metal particle causes optical breakdown on the individual droplet or particle and leads to a drop of the detonation minimum pulse energy of the mixture. Mathematical models of various stages of the optical breakdown are developed and applied to the analysis of laser-induced breakdown in particle-laden systems. The numerical calculations are based on an in-house computer code using the finite-volume method and high-resolution scheme. The threshold of optical breakdown and its dependence on contributing factors (droplet radius, location of droplet, total energy and time of laser pulse, radius of laser spot) has been studied. Minimum pulse energy of detonation was computed in the hydrogen-oxygen mixture with metal particles and liquid droplets.