A Prototype of Multi-zone Materials Processing Facility in Space

A prototype of multi-zone materials processing facility for space applications has been developed for the future space materials science research in China. The prototype primarily consists of 4 parts, including a furnace, a sample unit, a driving mechanism system and a controller. The ten-zone furnace is specially designed for materials processing by both the Zone-melting and the Bridgman methods, with a maximum temperature of 1300 degrees C and a maximum axial temperature gradient of 40 degrees C/cm. The sample unit consists of 12 magazines with 3 cartridges inside each magazine. Therefore, a total of 36 samples can be processed sequentially during once launch mission. The driving mechanism system consists of a sample rotating assembly, a sample linear exchange assembly and a sample translation assembly. The controller is a programmable microprocessor system of duel functions for system operation control and for data acquisition. By utilizing the prototype, BGO single crystal has been grown successfully on the earth.