Don Pettit是美国NASA的资深宇航员,2002年11月至2003年5月,在国际空间站工作期间,进行了一系列名为Saturday Morning Science的微重力实验,Don Pettit实验揭示了微重力下一些令人惊奇的现象,涉及流体力学、气泡动力学、晶体生长以及运动学的诸多基础问题,是能够获得的国际空间站为数不多的微重力实验资料,具有重要研究意义,实验包括14组流体实验和7组力学实验,而流体实验又大致分为水膜实验和水球实验,包括大尺寸水膜制备、扩散和对流、Marangoni对流、薄膜结晶、水球/气泡旋转等,本文对Don Pettit实验的流体部分进行了介绍,并对其中的Marangoni对流和薄膜结晶实验现象进行了解析。
The microgravity experiments "Saturday Morning Science" carried by Don Pettit, senior science astronaut, in 2003 on International Space Station was introduced in the present paper. The experiments video which has become available on NASA website demonstrates a variety of surprising phenomena which are highly related to the basic sciences in fluid convection, mechanics, crystallography, kinematics and so on. The experiments include 14 fluid experiments and 7 mechanical experiments. Only fluid experiments were narrated in this paper, particularly "Marangoni convection" and "thin film crystallizer" were compared with their counterparts on ground and the effects of microgravity on relevant phenomena were analyzed.