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Airlock substitute



 
 
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  #1  
Old March 17th 12, 10:28 AM
Armin Armin is offline
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Default Airlock substitute

Hi,
I was wondering if we can use plasma shields like "plasma window" or force fields instead of airlocks to let the astronaut get through them without letting air to go out.Although can we use magnetic fields to draw back some of lost air?
  #2  
Old March 19th 12, 03:05 AM posted to sci.space.tech
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Default Airlock substitute

On Mar 17, 10:19 am, Armin wrote:
Hi,
I was wondering if we can use plasma shields like "plasma window" or
force fields instead of airlocks to let the astronaut get through them
without letting air to go out.


Plasma is a hot, ionized gas. It is not an ideal pressure barrier, and
at about 1 atmosphere of pressure plasma would resemble a very high
temperature blow torch.

Although can we use magnetic fields to
draw back some of lost air?


Not really. Oxygen is paramagnetic, so it responds weakly to magnetic
fields, but it would require impractically high field strengths.
Nitrogen is diamagnetic, so it'd be weakly repelled by strong fields.

Mike Miller, Materials Engineer

  #3  
Old May 10th 12, 05:44 PM posted to sci.space.tech
Anvil*[_2_]
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Default Airlock substitute

Armin:
Although can we use magnetic fields to draw back some of lost air?

-----

Sorry, even a few Gs of gravity won't get gas to behave.

Best option would be to use a compound turbomolecular pump and
compressor to move most of the air into a container before opening up.
This assumes an airlock that is not near Earth since the weight/value
has to be better than just bringing additional make-up air. A moon
base or Mars mission perhaps, but on manned asteroid surveys I would
say very likely.

 




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