On progressive blast envelope evolution of charged particles in electromagnetic fields

In this paper, we investigate the explosion of a set of charged particles in an electromagnetic field and the progressive time-evolution of the blast envelope. It is shown that the initial spherical blast envelope evolves into the shape of an ellipsoid whose longitudinal axis is aligned with the magnetic field. Specifically, the individual particles rotate around the longitudinal axis, and rotate in decaying orbits until they become stationary, leaving a stationary overall ellipsoidal configuration of particles. In order to investigate this system, a direct multiparticle model is constructed, which balances the detonation energy released from the initial blast pulse with the subsequent particle-system kinetic energy and then computes the trajectories of the discrete interacting material under the influence of the electromagnetic field and drag from any surrounding medium. Under certain simplifying assumptions, the model can be solved for analytically, which provides a guide to identifying the key parameters that control the evolving blast envelope. Three dimensional examples are provided to illustrate the framework/method.