Chapter 22: Maximum Likelihood Analysis of Critical Energy Initiation Criterion

Critical initiation criteria, such as P²T, predict the response of high explosives undergoing limited duration shock loading, specifically if a shock to detonation transition (SDT) will occur. Determination of the fitting parameters required by critical initiation criteria is generally done by subject matter expert (SME) judgement, or occasionally, inappropriate application of least-squares fitting. Adopting a maximum likelihood estimation approach to the fitting of critical initiation criteria offers significant benefits over SME judgement or leastsquares fitting. Specific benefits include transforming the criteria from deterministic to probabilistic tools, robust accounting of outliers, and consistent and explicable generation of parameters.