October 2
@
4:00 PM
–
5:00 PM
The ME 903: Graduate Student Lecture Series features campus and visiting speakers who present on a variety of research topics in the field of mechanical engineering. Professor Suo Yang is a professor at the University of Minnesota.
Presentation title: Multi-Physics Modeling for Future Aerospace Propulsion and Energy
Abstract: In the development of future aerospace propulsion and energy systems, the pursuit of high efficiency, high speed, low emission, and low noise is pushing the systems to operate at extreme conditions. These conditions and associated emerging technologies often introduce complicated multi-scale physics, bringing new challenges to modeling and simulation in terms of both fidelity and computational cost. In this presentation, I will mainly talk about two examples of such multi-physics modeling from our works: (1) Plasma assisted combustion (PAC) is a promising technology to enable ultra-fast ignition and stable combustion using low-reactivity fuels (e.g., ammonia for decarbonization, and low-cetane sustainable/synthetic aviation fuels) or at extreme conditions (e.g., high-speed flows in scramjets for hypersonic propulsion). We developed a series of 0D-3D PAC models with unprecedented predictivity, unraveled the mechanisms of simultaneous ignition acceleration and NOx emission reduction by non-equilibrium plasma in ammonia combustion, and investigated the influence of discharge pulsing frequency, plasma streamer evolution, inter-electrode gap distance, igniter placement, and turbulence on ignition performance. (2) Advanced liquid-fueled rocket and gas-turbine jet engines (based on deflagration or detonation) operate at high pressures to achieve high efficiency and high energy density. At such conditions, the supercritical liquid-like fuel often goes through transcritical multi-component phase transition upon mixing with the oxidizer stream or colliding with detonation/shock waves. We developed a series of computationally efficient and robust multiphase flow models based on the first-principled real-fluid vapor-liquid equilibrium (VLE) theory to predict high-pressure multi-component phase transition, and investigated its interactions with mixing, combustion, detonation, (hypersonic) shocks, and expansion waves.
Bio: Dr. Suo Yang is an Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Minnesota. During 2017-2018, He was a Postdoctoral Research Associate in Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering at Princeton University. Dr. Yang received his Ph.D. (2017) and M.S. (2014) degrees in Aerospace Engineering, and another M.S. degree in Computational Science & Engineering (2015), all from the Georgia Institute of Technology. He received a B.S. degree in Mathematics & Applied Mathematics from Zhejiang University in 2011. Dr. Yang’s research focuses on the modeling and simulation of turbulent reacting & multiphase flows, including combustion, non-equilibrium plasma, particulate & multiphase flows, and hypersonics, with applications in aerospace propulsion & energy systems. He is an awardee of the 2021 DARPA Young Faculty Award (YFA), 2022 ONR Young Investigator (YIP) Award, 2023 DARPA Director’s Fellowship Award, and 2024 AFOSR Young Investigator (YIP) Award. Dr. Yang has authored nearly 100 journal articles and refereed conference papers, in which he received 5 Editor’s Pick or Featured Article awards from Physics of Fluids and Combustion and Flame. Dr. Yang is a Senior Member of AIAA and a member of 3 AIAA Technical Committees. He has served as a Technical Discipline Chair or Deputy Chair 5 times for AIAA SciTech Forums. He also actively serves as a reviewer for many top-tier journals for which he received 4 Outstanding Reviewer Awards.