Calculation of convective heat flux in the vicinity of the stagnation point for partially ionized gas flow past a body

From numerical solutions of the boundary layer equations for a four-component gas mixture (E, N⁺, N₂, and N) with gas injection, approximate formulas for the heat flux as a function of the variation of λρ/c_p and h^* across the boundary layer and the magnitude of the objection are obtained (λ is the thermal conductivity of the mixture,ρ is density, c_p is the specific heat, and h^* is the enthalpy of the ideal gas state of the mixture). An effective ambipolar diffusion coefficient D^(a)(i) is introduced, making possible finite formulas for the convective heat fluxes in the “frozen” boundary layer. We study the behavior of these coefficients within the boundary layer. A formula is obtained for convective heat flux to the wall from partially ionized air for a nine-component mixture (E, O⁺, N⁺, NO⁺, O, N, NO, O₂ N₂). Even for simpler four-component gas model three effective ambipolar diffusion coefficients are necessary: $$\begin{gathered} D^{(a)} (A) = D (A, M) D^{(a)} (I) = 2D (A, M), \hfill \\ D^{(a)} (M) = 1 + c_e (I)] D(A, M). \hfill \\ \end{gathered} $$ Here D(A, M) is the binary diffusion coefficient of the atoms into molecules, and c_e(I) is the ion concentration at the outer edge of the boundary layer. The assumption of an infinitely large charge-exchange cross section and the other simplifying assumptions used in 1] lead to overestimation of the magnitude of the dimensionless heat flux by 7–15% for the “frozen” boundary layer case.