Gas & Plasma Dynamics Laboratory

Our proposal titled “Collaborative Research: Lab-Data-Enabled Modeling, Numerical Methods, and Validation for a Three-Dimensional Interface Inverse Problem for Plasma-Material Interactions” is selected for funding by NSF. [link]…

Jianxun Zhao successfully passed the Ph.D. Comprehensive Exam. Congratulations!…

Our paper co-authored with Prof. Yan of Civil Engineering and titled “A review of approaches to simulate windborne debris dynamics in wind fields” got accepted by the Journal of Wind Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamics! [link]…

Our paper co-authored with Prof. He of Mathematics and Prof. Zhang of Oklahoma State, titled “PIFE-PIC: Parallel Immersed-Finite-Element Particle-in-Cell for 3-D Kinetic Simulations of Plasma-Material Interactions” got accepted by SIAM Journal on Scientific Computing (SISC)!…

Our group attended the virtual AIAA SciTech Forum 2021. David and Jianxun did a great job presenting our papers on the numerical modeling and simulation fronts!…

Our paper co-authored with Prof. Du of IUPUI and titled “Physics-Based Gaussian Process Method for Predicting Average Product Lifetime in Design Stage” got accepted by the Journal of Computing and Information Science in Engineering! [link]…

Our paper co-authored with Prof. Du of IUPUI and titled “Adaptive Kriging Method for Uncertainty Quantification of the Photoelectron Sheath and Dust Levitation on the Lunar Surface” got accepted by the ASME Journal of Verification, Validation and Uncertainty Quantification! [link]…

Xinpeng successfully defended his Ph.D. dissertation titled “Time- and Space-Dependent Uncertainty Analysis and its Application in Lunar Plasma Environment Modeling”. Congratulations to Dr. Wei!…

We are going to start an exciting project upgrading the large vacuum facility with thermal-cycling and more plasma/diagnostic systems through an AFOSR DURIP grant! [link]…

Group members are awarded the Missouri Space Grant Consortium scholarships/fellowships. Congratulations and Good Job!…

Blake successfully defended his M.S. thesis titled “Characterization of a Plasma Source Simulating Solar Wind Plasma in a Vacuum Chamber”. Congratulations to Blake!…

Our paper co-authored with Prof. Du of IUPUI and titled “Approximation to Multivariate Normal Integral and Its Application in Time-Dependent Reliability Analysis” got accepted by the journal Structural Safety! [link]…

Our Experiment Team led by Terry and Blake successfully demonstrated an interesting concept of using solar wind plasma as direct ISRU electricity power source – through lighting up an LED inside the plasma chamber!…

Kyle McMillen won the Second Prize at the 2020 Fuller Prize Competition for Undergraduate Research organized by Missouri S&T’s Physics department. Congratulations to Kyle! [link]…

Terry and Blake presented our experimental work at The Impact of Lunar Dust on Human Exploration Workshop held at Houston, Texas….

Our group attended the AIAA SciTech Forum 2020. David, Terry and Blake, and Jianxun did a great job presenting our papers on both numerical and experimental fronts!…

Dr. Han attended the Annual Meeting of the Lunar Exploration Analysis Group held at Washington, D.C. with the support from the LEAG Bernard Ray Hawke Next Lunar Generation Career Development Award, sponsored by NASA SSERVI. [link]…

First successful firing of our RF plasma source in the vacuum chamber! Congratulations to our Experiment Team!…

David Lund presented our work “Fully Kinetic PIFE-PIC Simulations of Plasma Charging at Lunar Craters” at The 5th Annual Meeting of SIAM Central States Section held at Iowa State University, October 19-20, 2019, Ames, IA….

Group members are awarded the Missouri Space Grant Consortium scholarships/fellowships. Congratulations and Good Job!…

Two papers based on Dr. Han’s dissertation study, “Numerical Simulations of Dust Dynamics Around Small Asteroids” [link] and “3-D Fully Kinetic Particle-in-Cell Simulations of Small Asteroid Charging in the Solar Wind” [link], were published by IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science….

David Lund and Robert Foley will join our group. Welcome!…

David Lund presented our work “Design and Development of Plasma Sources for Laboratory Investigations of Plasma-Material Interactions” at The 28th Annual Spring Meeting of the NASA-Missouri Space Grant Consortium held at Missouri S&T, April 26-27, 2019, Rolla, MO….

Zhangli Hu passed the Ph.D. defense. Congratulations to Dr. Hu!…

Dr. Han presented the benchmarking studies on the parallel efficiency of the PIFE-PIC code at the 4th Annual Meeting of SIAM Central States Section held at Norman, OK….

Terence McGarvey joined our group. Welcome!…

Dr. Han presented two studies at the 45th IEEE International Conference on Plasma Science (ICOPS 2018) held at Denver, CO. One talk focused on “Current Coupling via Electron Emission in Fast and Mesothermal Ion Beams”. The other talk focused on the development progress of the PIFE-PIC code….

Our paper, “Immersed Finite Element Particle-in-Cell Simulations of Plasma Charging at the Lunar Terminator”, was published online at AIAA Journal of Spacecraft and Rockets. [link]…

Dr. Han presented a poster on the PIFE-PIC code at NASA Fundamental Physics Workshop 2018 held at La Jolla, CA….

Dr. Han presented the first paper about PIFE-PIC code (paper number AIAA-2018-2196 [link]) at AIAA SciTech Forum and Exposition 2018 held at Kissimmee, FL….

Jianxun Zhao and Blake Folta joined our group. Welcome!…

Dr. Han gave a talk about the IFE-PIC method at Missouri Institute for Computational and Applied Mathematical Sciences (MICAMS) in Rolla, MO….

Dr. Han presented a paper on ion beam neutralization (paper number IEPC-2017-473) at the 35th International Electric Propulsion Conference (IEPC) held at Atlanta, GA….

Dr. Han started at Missouri S&T as a faculty member….