**6. Conclusions**

The major area of interest is using plasma to preheat probe models that can be used for ablation studies in cold flow hypersonic wind tunnels. This novel plasma preheating technology is capable of generating the needed heat flux for the surface temperature characterisation without using any Arc-Jet or plasmatron facilities. This technique aims to produce a newer and better method of aerothermodynamic tests for investigating ablation samples of reentry probes in expansion tubes. The probe used in the present work was very similar to the European Standard Probe with a stagnation temperature of about 2500 K. The advantages that are associated with this newly innovated plasma preheating technique include: (1) light weight and portability of model; (2) surface temperature control; (3) the ability to replicate entries for different planetary missions due to its capability to perform well in most types of reentry gases like O2 N2, Air, CO2, He, Ne, Ar, H2, CH4, NH3, etc.; (4) ability to be applied to different types of heatshield materials like PICA, SIRCA, Avecoats, C/C Composites, graphite, etc.; (5) ability to be used for different axisymmetric payload geometries like Stardust, Orion, Hayabusa, SpaceX-dragon, etc.; (6) ability to perform well in both short and long duration wind tunnels including shock tunnels; and (7) highly economical and less than 10% of the operational costs of running the high enthalpy plasmatron and NASA Ames Arc-Jet facilities. This work presents reasonable contributions to reentry studies under conditions that replicate characteristics of hypersonic reentry flights. Future applications for the technique are expected to be found in hypersonic impulse facilities that can simulate the true flow energy under reentry conditions.
