Experimental and Computational Program for Slow and Fast Cookoff for Insensitive Munitions Testing

We propose a joint experimental and computational program to predict the behavior of heterogeneous energetic materials, specifically the properties and dynamics of their initiation, during slow and fast cookoff for insensitive munitions testing. The experimental effort will involve gram-scale fast and slow cookoff experiments in fully instrumented test cells, allowing for spatial and temporal resolution of critical dynamic variables. The modeling effort will focus on multiscale, multiphysics simulations using validated models on high-performance parallel computer platforms. Intermediate scale modeling is crucial to bridging the enormous gap between device-scale models that are often based on empirical modeling rather than first principles, and atomistic-scale models that take into account the underlying discrete nature of matter but are often difficult to relate to engineering-scale results. Our multiscale approach to modeling and simulation will explicitly address physical features and phenomena at the macro- (device), meso- (aggregate of crystals) and micro-scales (individual crystal) in an integrated manner.