SPACE SHUTTLE OUTGASSING

WE PROPOSE TO REVIEW AND ANALYZE PHENOMENA ASSOCIATED WITH THE SPACE SHUTTLE CONTAMINANT CLOUD WHICH LEADS TO ION FORMATION. THE AVAILABLE DATA BASE ON NEUTRAL AND IONIC SPECIES IN THE SHUTTLE CLOUD WILL BE CRITICALLY REVIEWED AND GENERIC CONTAMINANT SPECIES SOURCE TERMS DEFINED. POTENTIAL KINETIC MECHANISMS BETWEEN IONOSPHERIC SPECIES AND CLOUD SPECIES, ALONG WITH SUBSEQUENT SECONDARY REACTIONS, WILL BE EVALUATED WITH PARTICULAR EMPHASIS ON REACTION ENERGETICS. ADDITIONAL IONIC SOURCE TERMS, SUCH AS GAS SURFACE INTERACTIONS, WILL ALSO BE ASSESSED. LASTLY, THE POSSIBLE IMPACT OF ELECTROMAGNETIC FORCES, PECULIAR TO SHUTTLE, ON THE IONIC KINETICS WILL BE EVALUATE. THE PROJECT RESULT WILL BE A SPECIFICATION OF SOURCE STRENGTHS AND ENERGY DISTRIBUTIONS OF IONS WITHIN THE SHUTTLE CLOUD FOR SPECIFIC SHUTTLE FLIGHT SCENARIOS. THESE RESULTS WILL FORM A BASIS FOR DESIGNING FLIGHT EXPERIMENTS TO MORE ACCURATELY TEST THE ON-ORBIT ENVIRONMENT. THUS THEY ARE THE FIRST STEP TOWARD UNDERSTANDING AND IMPROVING THAT ENVIRONMENT.