| AVS 54th International Symposium | |
| Vacuum Technology | Wednesday Sessions |
| Session VT-WeA |
| Session: | Miniature, Portable and Space Vacuum Applications |
| Presenter: | R.J. Kline-Schoder, Creare Incorporated |
| Authors: | R.J. Kline-Schoder, Creare Incorporated P.H. Sorensen, Creare Incorporated |
| Correspondent: | Click to Email |
NASA and other organizations have pressing needs for miniaturized high vacuum systems. Recent advances in sensor technology at NASA and commercial laboratories have led to the development of highly miniaturized mass spectrometers, and miniaturized versions of other analytical instruments are under development. However, the vacuum systems required to support these sensors remain large, heavy, and power hungry. In particular, high vacuum systems of adequate performance continue to be too large for systems such as time-of-flight, quadrupole, and ion trap mass spectrometers that are intended to be man-portable or to be deployed on UAVs, balloons, or interplanetary probes. The terrestrial, man portable applications impacted by this problem include military and homeland defense systems for detecting hazardous materials as well as portable leak detectors for commercial use. For 10 years, Creare has been developing the technologies required to design and build miniature high vacuum pumps. During this time, we have designed and built two small high vacuum pumps that have the following pumping characteristics: a compression ratio for air that is greater than 108; a pumping speed of about 5 L/sec; and 10 W power consumption for an exhaust pressure of 10 Torr. The smallest of these pumps has a mass of 130 g, a diameter of 1.3 in., and an overall length of 2.3 in (i.e. the size of a c-cell battery). The slightly larger pump has a mass of 500 g, a diameter of 2.0 in., and an overall length of 4.6 in (i.e. the size of a soda can). The larger version is being space qualified for use on a NASA Mars mission scheduled for launch in 2009. The challenges of designing and building miniature turbomolecular/molecular drag pumps include: design of pump geometry in regions where little data exist, the need for precision machining of components, and the electromagnetic and mechanical design of very high speed, efficient, miniature electric motors. Data will be presented that show the performance, over a wide temperature range, of a brassboard prototype of the pump NASA currently plans to deploy on the Mars Science Laboratory mission.