Chelsea Johnson
(Advisor: Professor Joseph C. Oefelein)
will propose a doctoral thesis entitled,
A Coupled Wall-Model Framework for Large Eddy Simulation of Shock-Wave/Boundary-Layer and Fluid-Structure Interactions
On
Monday, April 3rd at 9:30 a.m.
MK Room 317
Abstract
Over the past decade, accurately simulating unsteady, multiphysics, supersonic and hypersonic flows has received significant interest from the scientific community. Advances in hypersonic weapons and increased government and commercial space travel have driven progress on experimental, computational and theoretical fronts. Particular emphasis has been placed on the ability to predict the effects of shock waves interacting with the boundary layer, including unsteady behavior and separation, which can lead to adverse effects such as less effective control surfaces, scramjet engine unstart, and damage to a vehicle's surface. Additionally, due to increased desire for lightweight, maneuverable weapons and reusable vehicles, the interaction between fluid flow and thin panels of a vehicle has emerged as a challenge and therefore a focus of research. The tight physical coupling between fluid-structure interactions (FSI) and shock-wave/boundary-layer interactions (SBLI) is proven to be challenging to accurately simulate due to disparate time scales, strict numerical requirements, and large Reynolds numbers. This thesis will focus on the development and validation of a wall-model framework that can be used to both accurately and affordably analyze realistic, high Reynolds number flows of SBLI over elastic panels. In addition, it will assess and refine coupling strategies with FSI using a nonlinear dynamic model of an elastic panel fed with both equilibrium and non-equilibrium wall-modeled LES to determine the panel response. This will then be fed back into the wall-modeled LES at the wall boundary to establish the degree of coupling required and corresponding disparities in time and length scales between the two systems that must be considered to obtain predictive solutions in a reliable manner.
Committee
• Prof. Joseph C. Oefelein – School of Aerospace Engineering (advisor), Georgia Institute of Technology
• Prof. Earl H. Dowell – Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science, Duke University
• Prof. Venkat Narayanaswamy – Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, North Carolina State University
• Prof. Cristina Riso – School of Aerospace Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology
• Prof. Lakshmi N. Sankar – School of Aerospace Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology