Active In-Situ Contamination Control

"The objective of the proposed program is to demonstrate that CO2 jet spray cleaning can be applied to the in-situ contamination control of optics in future Space Based Laser weapon systems. The ability to remove particulate contamination and achievecleanliness levels of 100 on ultra low absorption coatings on single crystal silicon substrates will be demonstrated via scatter measurements. Electrostatic charge effects that may impact the contamination control process will be assessed. On phase 2, theconceptual design of a cleaning system developed on phase 1 will be built and used to establish whether successful in-situ particle removal can be applied in an SBL geometry without re-contaminating other optical surfaces. The experimentation will beperformed in a vacuum, be in a geometry that is representative of SBL systems and make use of the Active Contamination Experiment for SBIRS low (ACES) program hardware. The result will be an affordable experiment that can subsequently be upgraded to ashuttle hitch-hiker experiment to validate the technology in space. Provides a fail-safe method to achieve extremely high particulate cleanliness levels on optics critical to SBL performance in space. Can also be applied to airborne and ground based lasersystems that have similar cleanliness levels making them costly to maintain. Commercial applications include contamination control for commercial satellites, space manufacturing processes and part