A Study on Plasma Formation on Hypersonic Vehicles using Computational Fluid Dynamics

This study focuses on understanding high-temperature effects and plasma formation in sub-orbital hypersonic flight using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations. The research compares two models with different kinetic parameters derived from shock tube experiments and state-to-state chemical kinetics. The simulations consider various Mach numbers and altitudes relevant to reentry conditions. Results show that the choice of model and the number of species composing the mixture significantly impact the flow field, with the more recent model demonstrating improved accuracy compared to experimental and numerical data

Hybrid Fidelity Optimization of Efficient Airfoils and Rotors in Ultra-Low Reynolds Numbers Conditions

The unmanned aerial systems (UAS) design for flight in the Martian atmosphere is thriving. This paper discusses the aerodynamic optimization of airfoils and blades at ultra-low Reynolds number conditions. In the case of airfoils, the performance predictions are carried out using unsteady Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). We analyzed the influence of the Reynolds number on optimal geometries and proposed a globally efficient airfoil. We computed the polar of these airfoils to generate an aerodynamic database as they are necessary for rotor reduced-order models. This work focuses on optimizing and comparing two and 3-bladed rotors. We used the Blade Element Method (BEM) to generate efficient geometries employing a genetic algorithm and evaluated the resultant geometries with higher fidelity CFD simulations. Final refinement of the presented geometries is performed with a CFD adjoint optimization