From: Medical Electronics Lab <rosing@neurophys.wisc.edu>
Newsgroups: sci.physics.electromag,sci.physics.plasma
Subject: Re: #1. Possible EW apps for Plasma Mirrors ???
Organization: Dept. Neurophysiology, U. Wisconsin


aufsj@IMAP2.ASU.EDU wrote:
>
> I was doing some back of the envelope stuff the other day and
> came up with some ideas that seem, at my first (and out of my specialty!)
> glance to be possibly promising. I'm not a physicist, or even an
> electrical engineer, having actually entered the subject via the back
> door of computer science. So if I don't get the nobel (or a big grant)
> perhaps y'all will at least get a good laugh. :-)

You'd be supprised what the military has already paid people to study.

[.....] description of "plasma mirror" deleted.

> Well, what part of the big picture am I missing? It seems that
> at least some doppler spoofing should be attainable, yet I haven't heard
> of it being done. I'm certain I'll hear why soon..... :-)

Energy to run it for one thing. A plasma is ionized gas, it takes an
eV (electron Volt) or so to ionize most atoms, and when you want to keep
things ionized it adds up to lots of electrons and lots of volts: volts
times current is power. So you need a big power plant. Putting this on
a missle ain't gonna happen. A nuclear powered ship is another story,
power is certainly available. But phased array radar can do the same thing,
with no moving parts, no special gas tubes, and much less power consumption.

In many ways, metal can be looked at as a plasma. There are free electrons
in the band gaps and as long as the energy density does not exceed the gap
the metal won't break down, melt, etc. In principle, the ideas are sound,
but you can do it with regular antenna arrays. No need for plasmas.

I should point out that "plasma mirrors" are used a lot in radar systems.
A forward pulse to an antenna has enough power to ionize a gas in a return
path, protecting the receive side from any backwards reflected power.
That way you can use the same radar for both transmit and recieve, there's
no moving parts, and it always works when it needs to (you can change the
timing on transmit power without worrying about what's down stream).

If you really want to get creative with plasmas as weapons, check out
ball lightning. Figure out how launch a few of those (and how to block
them :) and you'll have caught up to Tesla circa 1910.

Patience, persistence, truth,
Dr. mike