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Energy 140 (2017) 18e26

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Energy

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Instantaneous monitoring of local fuel concentration in a liquidhydrocarbon-fueled flame using a LIBS plug

J.H. Kim a, S.H. Lee b, H. Do a, J.J. Yoh a, *

a Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Seoul National University, 1 Gwanakro, Gwanakgu, Seoul 151-742, South Koreab Division of Physical Metrology, Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science, 267 Gajeong-ro, Yuseong-Gu, Daejeon 34113, South Korea

a r t i c l e i n f o

Article history:Received 17 April 2017Received in revised form10 July 2017Accepted 16 August 2017Available online 17 August 2017

Keywords:Laser-induced plasmaEquivalence ratioPlasma emissionSpray flame

* Corresponding author.E-mail address: jjyoh@snu.ac.kr (J.J. Yoh).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.energy.2017.08.0810360-5442/© 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

a b s t r a c t

A portable device composed of photodiodes and bandpass filters was developed to measure local fuelconcentration in a liquid hydrocarbon-fueled spray flame. The plasma emission spectra in and aroundthe flame were selectively captured using such simplified device or plug instead of using a laboratorystandard laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) system consisting of an ICCD and a spectrometer.The hydrogen (656 nm) and oxygen (777 nm) atomic lines were selected to determine the fuel con-centration in atmospheric pressure. The H/O signal intensity ratio was found to be a strong function ofthe fuel concentration, and thus a calibration curve for the concentration measurements was establishedand validated using conventional LIBS. The proposed scheme to measure the local equivalence ratio ofspray flames using a bundled layout of multiple LIBS plugs alongside the combustor wall may offersimple and highly robust diagnostics, especially under the harsh combustion conditions within air-breathing engines.

© 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction

The reliable ignition of flammable mixtures is a fundamentalissue for combustion science. In various combustion systems e

including gas turbines and automotive engines e ignition is animportant step for reliable operation, and for such ignition eventsto take place, the spatial and temporal distributions of the fuel-airmixture must be understood. Specifically, the local equivalenceratio and instantaneous fuel concentration in and around thechemical reaction zone must be known. The equivalence ratio andthe fuel concentration have been measured either by using a sparkplug ion sensing or oxygen sensor placed in the spark position [1].Both measurement methods have a very slow response time todetect the fast flow dynamics associated with air-breathing en-gines. Therefore, they have only been implemented in limitedexperimental setups associated with static flow withoutcomplexity. To overcome such inherent limitations, various laserdiagnostics technologies have been introduced to detect theproperties of complex, reacting flow conditions.

The present study makes use of laser-induced breakdown

spectroscopy (LIBS), which is favorable in terms of detectingvarious state materials with real time acquisition, minimal systemcomplexity, and applicability in harsh chemical environmentscompared to other laser diagnostic systems. LIBS is a type ofemission spectroscopy that uses a high energy laser pulse as theexcitation source. The laser beam is focused with sufficient energyto dissociate and excitemolecules to generate a small plasmawith ahigh temperature. The atoms and electrons of the materials in theplasma volume absorb the photon energy, which results in exci-tation of the electrons in neutral atoms and ions. As the plasmacools, the excited ions and electrons move from their excited stateto ground states, emitting light with specific atomic frequencies inthe process. The plasma emission is collected and analyzed toobtain atomic information of unknown materials. As a result ofthese known advantages, LIBS has been previously applied in theanalysis of reacting flows to obtain a local equivalence ratio [1e10]and gas concentration [11e13]. Atomic lines of H, C, O, and N andmolecular bands of CN and C2 can be effectively acquired in hy-drocarbon fuel-air mixtures using LIBS. O and N signals will appearupon dissociation of air molecules as oxidizer while C and H signalswill appear upon the dissociation of hydrocarbon molecules as fuel.

Starvropoulos et al. first measured the equivalence ratio oflaminar premixed flames using LIBS [2]. The equivalence ratio ofthe laminar premixed [2e5] and/or diffusion [6,7] methane-air

Fig. 1. Standard LIBS setup to detect plasma emissions.

J.H. Kim et al. / Energy 140 (2017) 18e26 19

flames could be determined by the atomic lines of hydrogen andoxygen. The calibration curve between the H/O intensity ratio andthe equivalence ratio was established for each case. The equiva-lence ratio at various point of the flames was obtained using thecalibration curve. When LIBS is applied in reacting flows, atomicsignal ratios, such as H/O [2e8,13], H/N [12], and other combina-tions of the H/O/N signals [1,9,10] are quite useful in estimating theequivalence ratio, which is the real-time fuel concentration at thebreakdown point in the combustion chamber. In addition, C/N, C/O[14,15], and C2/CN [13] intensity ratios are often used since the Catomic signal and molecular band line that contains C can beobserved from fuel plasma. Therefore, the local concentration of airand fuel can be quantitatively measured using each signal intensityat the breakdown location.

Although numerous LIBS research studies have focused on gas-state reacting flows, only limited work has been performed on thecombustion of liquid-state fuels. Gebel et al. [16] captured thebreakdown emissions in kerosene spray and quantitativelyanalyzed both the diameter and shape of the emission. The opticalemission spectra, such as H, N, O, CN, and C2 signals, were observedwith various time delays. Lee et al. [17] found that the size andconcentration of the droplet in the gasoline spray has a linearrelationship with the C2 intensity. Since the combustion charac-teristics in liquid fuels have notable differences compared togaseous fuels, work has been conducted in a two-phase flow usinga LIBS signal.

Moreover, the ignition failure can deliver a fatal blow to theengine because it will force the vehicle to stop. Particularly forhypersonic vehicles, the inlet unstart can cause an in-flight enginemalfunction, making the aircraft stall immediately. Therefore, it isimportant to provide an environment for ignition to be assured.Thus, a technique to quickly determine the instantaneous state ofthe combustion chamber is desirable.

A general LIBS system has limitations in determining the fuelproperties of the environment within the engine. The spectrometerand ICCD camera for the LIBS system are susceptible to damage todue impacts and harsh thermal stimuli, making it impossible tomount these on a vehicle engine. For this reason, we developed asmall LIBS plug composed of two photodetectors and bandpassfilters that can determine the instantaneous fuel properties toresolve such weaknesses of a real LIBS system. These miniaturizedLIBS plugs possess great advantages in terms of weight, size, cost,and complexity when compared to existing LIBS setups.

In the present study, the H and O atomic lines were measured inthe gasoline-air mixture using a LIBS plug. The obtained H/O in-tensity ratio was compared to the equivalence ratio of the gasoline-air mixture. The novelty of the work performed here lies in thedesign of the LIBS plug, which in principle can be placed as a bundlealongside the combustor wall where the local identification of flowproperties of a spray flame are desired in real time. The validity ofsuch photodetectors and filters in place of a full LIBS system(spectrometer/ICCD) was assessed by comparing the signals fromboth setups.

2. Experimental setup

2.1. Conventional LIBS setup

Fig. 1 shows the experimental setup to monitor liquid-fueledcombustion efficiency using conventional LIBS equipment. Ordi-nary gasoline fuel was purchased from a gas station and was used.The liquid fuel was sprayed with air through a siphon nozzle(Delavan 30609-2). Gasoline was injected through a pump thatcontrols the flow rate, and compressed air was injected through aMass Flow Controller (MFC). The flow rate of gasoline was fixed at

10 ml/min, and the flow rate of air was fixed at 10 L/min. Nd:YAGlaser (Continuum, Surelite І) withwavelength of 1064 nm and pulseduration of 5 ns was used. The laser energy was ~100 mJ with 3.15%coefficient of variation. The laser beamwas focused by using a lenswith a focal length of 100 mm to generate the plasma. In a con-ventional LIBS setup, the generated plasma emission was collectedusing an optical collector or an ICCD camera (Andor iStar) via aspectrometer (Andor Mechelle 5000). The delay time of the ICCDcamera was 1 ms, and the ICCD camera was exposed for 20 ms. Onlytwo peaks (H: 656 nm, O: 777 nm) were identified for the analysis.

2.2. Miniaturizing the LIBS setup: photodiodes and bandpass filter-embedded plug

In this paper, we produced a LIBS plug as part of a novel devicesetup for combustion diagnosis. Instead of using a spectrometerand ICCD camera with original LIBS equipment, photodiodes andbandpass filters were used for the LIBS plug. The fuel propertieswere determined using LIBS generally using the equivalence ratiofrom H and O atomic signals. Accordingly, the LIBS plug wasdeveloped using bandpass filters to pass the wavelength corre-sponding to the H atomic line and O atomic line to determine theequivalence ratio of the fuel. The pictured image of the device isshown in Fig. 2, and the cross-sectional drawing of the plug isdepicted in Fig. 3. A laser beam passing through a plug is focusedwith a lens, generating plasma onto a target point, and the resultingplasma emissions are collected along the same path in the photo-diodes with bandpass filers to detect the specific wavelengths ofthe emission spectrum. The photodiode signals are transmitted toan oscilloscope through a BNC-style cable. The bandpass filters B1and B2 are utilized to obtain the atomic signals, as shown in Table 1.To obtain the H atomic signal, a bandpass filter with a centerwavelength (CWL) of 656 nm and a full width-half-max (FWHM) of10 nm was used in the device. To obtain the O atomic signal, abandpass filter with CWL of 780 nm and FWHM of 10 nm wasutilized. The diameters of the two bandpass filters are both at12.5 mmwith a minimum transmission of 50%. A UV plano convexfused silica lens was used to focus the laser beam while collectingthe plasma emission. The diameter of the convex lens was 15 mm,and the focal length was 25 mm. Si photodiodes (FDS010, Thorlabs)were used to measure the plasma emission. The rise time of thephotodiodes was 1 ns, and the peak responsivity was 0.44 A/W at730 nm. To miniaturize the device, the laser and the plasma pathswere aligned into a single path, and the plug was connected to aBNC-style cable to transmit the collected signal.

Fig. 2. Image of a LIBS plug to sense the H/O signal.

Fig. 3. Schematic illustration of the cross plane of a LIBS plug.

Table 1Bandpass filter specification.

Bandpass Filter Center Wavelength Full Width Half Max

B1 656 nm 10 nmB2 780 nm 10 nm

Fig. 4. Schematic illustration of multiple LIBS plugs collecting plasma emission of aspray flame.

J.H. Kim et al. / Energy 140 (2017) 18e2620

2.3. Expanded experimental composition in the laboratory

Unlike a conventional LIBS method, laser-induced plasmaemission in the droplet was collected using photodetectors withbandpass filters B1 and B2 (656 ± 10 nm and 780 ± 10 nm,respectively, Table 1) to pass through wavelengths correspondingto hydrogen and oxygen atomic lines. The collected emissions wereobserved using an oscilloscope (Teledyne LeCroy, WAVESURFER64MXS-B). Fig. 4 shows a schematic illustration of multiple plugsused to detect plasma emissions in gasoline spray. Only a singleplug was used in the present study to conduct a proof-of-conceptexperiment.

The gasoline-air mixture contained in a uniform droplet streamwas used to construct a calibration curve with various equivalenceratios. The uniform droplet was generated by the ultrasonicnebulizer with a vibrating ceramic plate at a 1.65 MHz frequency.The droplets were sent to the bunsen burner via an air dryingchannel. The fuel flow rate into the nebulizer was fixed at 3 ml/min,and the equivalence ratio of the mixture was controlled by usingthe various air flow rates in the range of 6 L/min to 28 L/min. Themixture conditions are presented in Table 2. The equivalence ratiois defined as:

F ¼�mfuel

.mair

��mfuel

.mair

�stoich

: (1)

The stoichiometric fuel-to-air ratio in the gasoline-air mixture is0.068, and the inlet velocity of the stream varied from 0.5 m/s to4 m/s. This specific experimental configuration was derived fromour previous research [17].

3. Results

3.1. Spectral lines from conventional LIBS

At first, we performed the original LIBS experiment to investi-gate the spectra from gasoline in further detail. Fig. 5 shows thesignals obtained from a conventional LIBS setup with variousequivalence ratios of a gasoline-air mixture. Based on the peakvalues, H Balmer-a, O I, and N I atomic lines could be identified. Oand N signals were detected due to the breakdown of air as anoxidizer. The H signal was generated by the breakdown of gasolineparticles (hydrocarbons). Therefore, the H atomic peak increased asthe equivalence ratio became higher. However, O and N atomicpeaks decreased with a higher equivalence ratio. The H signal had apeak at 656 nm and the O signal peaked at 777 nm (triplet at777.194 nm, 777.417 nm, 777.539 nm). However, an N signal wasgenerated at both 747 nm (746.831 nm, 744.229 nm, 742.364 nm)and 823 nm (824.239 nm, 821.634 nm). Such small differences inthe spectra formed at the same atomic line due to different degreesof degeneracy for each spectrum at the same energy level.

The atomic lines of hydrogen and oxygen with respect to thegate delay time at three different laser energies (50 mJ, 100 mJ, and150 mJ with 3.43%, 2.19%, and 1.48% coefficient of variation,respectively) in the spray are shown in Fig. 6 (a) and 6 (b). The gatewidth was fixed at 20 ms, and the delay time ranged from 100ns to1ms. Both intensities of the atomic signals increased slightly toabout 300 ns, and these signals decreased as time elapsed. Theintensity is influenced by various factors, including the laser energy,plasma temperature, number density of fuel droplets in plasma,and the inherent error of the equipment. In particular, the pump

Table 2Gasoline-air mixture condition.

Air volume flow rate (L/min) Gasoline volume flow rate (ml/min) Air mass flow rate (g/min) Gasoline mass flow rate (g/min) Equivalence ratio

28 3 34.3 2.16 0.9320 3 24.5 2.16 1.312 3 14.7 2.16 2.168 3 9.8 2.16 3.246 3 7.35 2.16 4.32

(a)

(b)Fig. 5. LIBS signals in gasoline-air mixture at height of 10 mm from a nozzle with threedifferent equivalence ratios (0.6, 1, and 4.3).

Fig. 6. LIBS signals of (a) H and (b) O according to the delay time at different laserenergies (50 mJ, 100 mJ, and 150 mJ).

J.H. Kim et al. / Energy 140 (2017) 18e26 21

operated in the pulsation mode, resulting in a non-constant fuelflow rate. Since all spectra are extracted from the same plasma, theintensities of the H and O signals have similar deviations, and theuncertainties in the signal intensities are 18%, 16%, and 12% corre-sponding to laser energies of 50 mJ, 100 mJ, and 150 mJ, respec-tively. Kobayashi et al. [18] compared atomic signals according to adelay time in for CH4, C2H4, C3H8, and C4H10 mixtures. They foundthat the intensities of the H and O atomic signals gradually

decreased to about 1 ms while the C atomic signal decayed atapproximately 100 ns in all mixtures. However, the atomic signalsremained somewhat after 1 ms in the present study because anadditional breakdown of hydrocarbon molecules occurred in gas-oline droplets rather than in the gas-phase fuel. In addition, manyfactors, such as the laser energy, exposure time of the camera, andsignal amplification of ICCD camera in the present study weredifferent from those in other studies. With a higher laser energy,the signals increased and decayed slower compared to those whena lower laser energy was used. This means that a higher laser en-ergy can generate an intense plasma, subsequently deriving a

J.H. Kim et al. / Energy 140 (2017) 18e2622

longer decay time. Furthermore, the plasma volume that containsgasoline droplets is dependent on the laser energy.

Air-breathing engines require a fast diagnostic method tomonitor the state of a chemical reaction. For example, the charac-teristic time of flow inside an SR-71 or X-51A engine is only 10 ms,and this is an extremely short time to determine the properties of areacting flow using standard LIBS sensors, not to mention issueswith size, cost, and complexity associated with a standard LIBSsetup. Instead, the necessary flowmeasurement can be achieved inprinciple using an improved and reliable setup associated withmultiple LIBS plugs arranged in a combustion chamber.

3.2. Temporal evolution of plasma emission from photodetectors

Photodetector signals of the plasma emission generated by alaser pulse (100 mJ) from an average of 30 single shots in air withB1 and B2 are shown in Fig. 7 (a) and (b), respectively. The signalmeasured at the beginning of the plasma generation indicates aplasma background continuum [19]. Since the continuum is from abroadband emission, a strong signal can be detected even if a filteris placed in front of the photodetector. However, the plasmaemission passing through the B1 filter decayed within about 250 nsafter the continuum disappeared, as shown in Fig. 7 (a), due to anear zero concentration of hydrogen in air. On the other hand, someextent of the plasma emission passing through the B2 filterremained until after the continuum disappeared because oxygenwas present in air (Fig. 7 b). In other words, filters and photode-tectors were used to obtain the lifetime of the atomic signals

Fig. 7. LIBS plug signals of (a) H and (b) O in the air.

generated from the plasma. In addition, a temporal evolution ofplasma emissionwith photodetectors at various pressures was alsoobserved [20]. At 1 atm, the plasma emission lasted for more than200 ns. Initially, the photon energy absorption is less under lowpressure conditions, but quenching is slower at the sametemperature.

The signals of the plasma emissions obtained by using a plugpassing through B1 and B2 in the gasoline-air mixture are shown inFig. 8 (a) and 8 (b), respectively. Each signal was obtained from anaverage of 30 single shots. In Fig. 5, the hydrogen signal had a peakat 656 nm and the oxygen signal had a peak at 777 nm, which in-dicates that plasma emission passing through B1 contained thehydrogen atomic line while the plasma emission passing throughB2 contained the oxygen atomic line. Therefore, the emission in-tensities passing through B1 and B2 represented a hydrogen atomicsignal and oxygen atomic signal, respectively.

Comparing Figs. 7 (a) and 8 (a), one could see that the shape ofthe signals generated in air was different from that generated in themixture. The H signal, defined here as the photon signal passing

(b)

(a)

Fig. 8. LIBS plug signals of (a) H and (b) O in gasoline-air mixture at various equiva-lence ratios (0.93, 1.3, 2.16, 3.24, and 4.32).

(a)

(b)Fig. 9. Intensity of the photodetector signal according to the equivalence ratio passingthrough bandpass filters (a) B1 and (b) B2 representing the H and O atomic signals,respectively.

J.H. Kim et al. / Energy 140 (2017) 18e26 23

through the B1 filter in themixture, remained for a long time unlikethat (mostly from the broadband emission, not from H atom) in air,as shown in Fig. 8(a). This occurs because hydrogen is contained ingasoline as fuel, and the hydrogen atomic signal from fuel is addedto the background signal. Therefore, a genuine hydrogen atomicsignal can be extracted by subtracting the signal obtained in airfrom that in the fuel mixture. On the other hand, as shown in Figs. 7(b) and 8 (b), the O signal from the air did not change significantly.Although the intensity of the signal and the decay time varieddepending on the equivalence ratio of the mixture, the overallshape of the signals did not change much due to the constantconcentration of oxygen in air. Fig. 8 (b) shows that the O signalpassing through B2 decreases as the equivalence ratio increasesbecause the amount of oxygen contained per unit volume of thegasoline-air mixture decreased as the equivalence ratio increases.

3.3. Analysis of signal intensity

As shown in Fig. 7 (a), the plasma background continuum re-mains for about 250 ns. Atomic signals in gasoline have been re-ported to disappear within about 1 ms [17]. The hydrogen andoxygen signal intensities were calculated based on the signals inFig. 8 (a) and (b) in the range of 250 ns to 1ms, respectively. The Hsignal intensity was constant at about 110 mV regardless of theequivalence ratio (Fig. 9). However, the O signal decreased linearlyfrom about 47 mV to 14 mV as the equivalence ratio increasedbecause the equivalence ratio of the mixture was controlled bychanging the air flow rate with a constant fuel flow rate. Therefore,the H signal was constant while the O signal decreases with anincrease in the equivalence ratio.

To verify the feasibility of using the plug to monitor the com-bustion efficiency, a conventional LIBS method was conducted tocompare a simultaneous detection of the optical spectra under thesame environment. Plasma emissions in the gasoline-air mixture offive equivalence ratios (0.93, 1.08, 1.3, 1.44, and 1.62) were detectedusing conventional LIBS and plug simultaneously by taking 30 lasershots in each composition for a shot-to-shot comparison. The re-sults of the shot-to-shot comparison between the H (656 nm)atomic signal of conventional LIBS and plug with B1 are shown inFig. 10 (a). The results of a comparison of the O (777 nm) atomicsignal using the twomethods are shown in Fig. 10 (b). Both the LIBSsignal and plug signal varied according to the intensity of plasmaemission regardless of the filter that was used. As shown in Fig. 10(a), although the H (656 nm) intensity measured using the con-ventional method had the same value with different compositions,the photodetector signals changed slightly. Since the H signal wasobtained from fuel, the LIBS signal fluctuated depending onwhether a droplet was present at the position where the plasmaoccurred. In addition, the broadband emission passing through B1increased as the equivalence ratio increased. Therefore, the datadistribution is slightly spread. On the other hand, the broadbandemission passing through B2 did not change much regardless of theequivalence ratio, and its data distribution was concentrated asshown in Fig. 10 (b). However, the average value of the LIBS signalwas lower as the equivalence ratio increased because the O atom inthe mixture decreased gradually.

The calibration curve of the H/O intensity ratio with the equiv-alence ratio of the mixture using the plug (bandpass filters andphotodetectors) is shown in Fig. 11 (a). The two variables had anearly linear relationship, with a coefficient of determination (R2)of 0.9958. The spectral signal intensity of the species should varylinearly with the number density of corresponding species, and theequivalence ratio (F) is defined as a mass of fuel and air. Then theequivalence ratio can be expressed regarding the atomic numberdensities of hydrogen and oxygen. Thus, the H and O intensity ratio

ended up varying linearly with the equivalence ratio, as has beenwell described in Ref. [3]. Lee et al. [17] performed an analysis forthe LIBS signals in the gasoline spray using a spectrometer and anICCD camera, and other studies have also demonstrated that the H/O intensity ratio has a linear relationship with an equivalence ratio[2e8]. Therefore, one can confirm the validity of analysis using theplug developed in this study with two-phase flow. During themeasurements of the laser focused position, temporal and spatialfluctuations of a two-phase flowmight occur. To verify the accuracyof the experiment using a filter and photodetector, it is necessary tostudy the shot-to-shot variation for a single laser pulse, and theresults of a single-shot H/O intensity ratio based on 30 single shotsat different equivalence ratios of the mixture are shown in Fig. 11(b). Each data point corresponds to a single shot with an indi-cated composition of the mixture. As shown in Fig. 11(b), the

Fig. 10. Shot to shot comparison between conventional LIBS signals and plug voltagesignals of (a) H and (b) O in gasoline-air mixture at various equivalence ratios (0.93,1.08, 1.3, 1.44, and 1.62).

(a)

(b)

Fig. 11. (a) Calibration curve for the H/O ratio as a function of the equivalence ratio inthe range of 0.92e5.18. (b) H/O ratio obtained in the gasoline mixture for 30 single shotspectra in the cases of F ¼ 0.93, 1.3, 2.16, 3.24, and 4.32.

J.H. Kim et al. / Energy 140 (2017) 18e2624

coefficient of the variation was less than 6% in a lean or stoichio-metric state. As the equivalence ratio increased, the deviationgradually increased. For F ¼ 2.16, 4.32, and >5, the coefficients ofvariation were about 8%, 8.5%, and 10%, respectively, and thesescattered results might have been affected by various parameters,including the fluctuation of the laser energy, plasma temperature,droplet interaction in the mixture, and so on. Kotzagianni et al.conducted similar experiments in turbulent methane flame forshot-to-shot measurements where the deviation in the H/O in-tensity ratio was reported to be less than 10% for a mole fraction ofless than 0.1 [13]. When the mole fraction increased to 0.3, thedeviation in the H/O intensity ratio increased to about 60%.

The equivalence ratio and ignition probability obtained by 40laser pulses at three different heights in a gasoline spray are shownin Fig. 12. The success or failure of ignition in a two-phase flowmight have been affected by various factors, such as temperature,atomization of the droplets, flow velocity gradient, and local

equivalence ratio at locations where a breakdown occurred. Theprobability of ignition is presented together with the equivalenceratio, and the equivalence ratio according to the position of thespray was calculated using the calibration curve shown in Fig. 11 (a)with the probability of the laser ignition measured at the sameposition. The ignition probability was defined as the number ofsuccessful ignitions divided by the total number of laser sparks. Athigher locations, further away from the spray nozzle, the gasolinefuel droplets further evaporate, and the fuel vapor diffuses outwardto increase the equivalence ratio away from the center of the flow.This increase in equivalence ratio, and likewise for the fuel con-centration, results in an overall increase in the number of fueldroplets in the plasma, leading to the generation of a more eminentand brighter flame kernel. The flame kernel lasting for an extendedtime can transfer its energy to nearby droplets, leading to an overallcombustion in the spray. The distribution of the ignition probabilitythat is shown supports this explanation regarding the equivalenceratios that are considered, and such a tendency in the equivalenceratio and ignition probability has also been shown in a methane jetdiffusion flame [7].

The LIBS plug can be used to rapidly determine the properties ofthe reacting flow, and this novel technology can be used to

Fig. 12. (a) Equivalence ratio and (b) Ignition probability for different heights (10 mm,20 mm, and 25 mm) from the nozzle in radial location for gasoline spray.

J.H. Kim et al. / Energy 140 (2017) 18e26 25

thoroughly examine the effect of the flowproperties on the spray tocomplement the flame stabilization/reliability in an internal en-gine. Due to the advantages of the device compared to the standardLIBS, a flight vehicle can achieve a reliable engine thrust under allpossible harsh flight conditions. Therefore, quantitative measure-ments of several operating conditions of the air-breathing enginescan fully provide practical guidance for innovative applications anddevice optimization.

4. Conclusions

A compact LIBS plug equipped with photodiodes and bandpassfilters was devised to detect selective plasma emission in this study.To verify the feasibility of using plasma spectroscopy with this newdevice consisting of photodetectors and bandpass filters, the fuelconcentration fields were measured in two-phase spray flames.

Bandpass filters with 656 ± 10 nm and 780 ± 10 nm were used toobserve the H and O signals, respectively, and the profile of the Hsignal time history in air showed a different shape and decay ratecompared to that in a two-phase fuel-air mixture flow while the Osignal showed no such difference. Since the plasma backgroundcontinuum diminishes with about 250 ns of delay and the atomicemission lines survive until about 1 ms, the photodetector signalsfrom 250 ns to 1 ms were analyzed to extract ideally pure H and Oatomic emission signal intensities. The intensity ratios of H(656 nm)/O (777 nm) were found to be linear with the localequivalence ratio of a gasoline-air mixture. Using the calibrationcurve, the local equivalence ratio in a two-phase spray flame wassuccessfully measured. Therefore, the onboard device with thenovel scheme proposed here can be used in principle to charac-terize the flow properties in real time at various locations within acombustor of air-breathing engines.

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the Lockheed Martin Corpora-tion through the Republic of Korea Science, Technology, andResearch (RoKST&R) program (Research Agreement S15-017monitored by Dr. K. K. Kim). Additional funding came from theAdvanced Research Center Program (NRF-2013R1A5A1073861)contracted through the Advanced Space Propulsion Research Cen-ter at Seoul National University and the Basic Science ResearchProgram (NRF-2015R1C1A1A01054539) funded by NationalResearch Foundation of Korea.

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