Arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian form of flowfield dependent variation (ALE-FDV) method for moving boundary problems

Flowfield Dependent Variation (FDV) method is a mixed explicit-implicit numerical scheme that was originally developed to solve complex flow problems through the use of so-called implicitness parameters. These parameters determine the implicitness of FDV method by evaluating local gradients of physical flow parameters, hence vary across the computational domain. The method has been used successfully in solving wide range of flow problems. However it has only been applied to problems where the objects or obstacles are static relative to the flow. Since FDV method has been proved to be able to solve many complex flow problems, there is a need to extend FDV method into the application of moving boundary problems where an object experiences motion and deformation in the flow. With the main objective to develop a robust numerical scheme that is applicable for wide range of flow problems involving moving boundaries, in this study, FDV method was combined with a body interpolation technique called Arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian (ALE) method. The ALE method is a technique that combines Lagrangian and Eulerian descriptions of a continuum in one numerical scheme, which then enables a computational mesh to follow the moving structures in an arbitrary movement while the fluid is still seen in a Eulerian manner. The new scheme, which is named as ALE-FDV method, is formulated using finite volume method in order to give flexibility in dealing with complicated geometries and freedom of choice of either structured or unstructured mesh. The method is found to be conditionally stable because its stability is dependent on the FDV parameters. The formulation yields a sparse matrix that can be solved by using any iterative algorithm. Several benchmark stationary and moving body problems in one, two and three-dimensional inviscid and viscous flows have been selected to validate the method. Good agreement with available experimental and numerical results from the published literature has been obtained. This shows that the ALE-FDV has great potential for solving a wide range of complex flow problems involving moving bodies

Numerical simulation of a highly underexpanded carbon dioxide jet

The underexpanded jets are present in many processes such as rocket propulsion, mass spectrometry, fuel injection, as well as in the process called rapid expansion of supercritical solutions (RESS). In the RESS process a supercritical solution flows through a capillary nozzle until an expansion chamber where the strong changes in the thermodynamic properties of the solvent are used to encapsulate the solute in very fine particles. The research project was focused on the hydrodynamic modeling of an hypersonic carbon dioxide jet produced in the context of the RESS process. The mathematical modeling of the jet was developed using the set of the compressible Navier-Stokes equations along with the generalized Bender equation of state. This set of PDE was solved using an adaptive discontinuous Galerkin discretization for space and the exponential Rosenbrock-Euler method for the time integration. The numerical solver was implemented in C++ using several libraries such as deal.ii and Sacado-Trilinos