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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 37 records · Page 2
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2021

Adaptive mesh based combustion simulations of direct fuel injection effects in a supersonic cavity flame-holder

Here, we present high-fidelity reacting simulations of a supersonic cavity flame-holder configuration. The focus of this work is on flame stabilization brought about by varying the location of fuel injection in a cavity stabilized supersonic flow of air. Central to our approach is a compressible multi-species reacting flow solver that uses adaptive-mesh-refinement (AMR), enabling the resolution of flame, shock-waves, boundary-layers, and small-scale structures in the computational domain. Our analysis indicates that fuel injection closer to the ramp at the aft end of the cavity allows for greater mixing and lower peak temperatures compared to fuel injection upstream that is closer to the backward facing step of the cavity. This difference is mainly due to greater turbulent fluctuations generated from the shear-layer towards the cavity ramp, thereby enhancing the mixing of fuel and air. A low frequency oscillatory behaviour in heat-release and pressure was also observed for the upstream injection case while a much higher-frequency phenomena was observed in the near-ramp injection case. By identifying the important physical determinants of the combustion processes, this study illustrates a promising pathway to design and optimize direct fuel injection strategies in supersonic cavity flame-holders that can improve flame stability, combustion efficiency, and reduce emissions.

42 ENGINEERING↗
DOE OSTI2026

Time-dependent-bases with local CUR decomposition method for accelerating turbulent combustion simulations

Here, this study presents a novel reduced-order modeling framework, Time-Dependent Bases with Local CUR decomposition (TDB-L-CUR), designed to efficiently and accurately approximate the species transport equations in reacting flow simulations. The method extends the existing TDB-CUR approach for chemically reacting flows (Jung et al. Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. Engrg. 437 (2025) 117758), which leverages matrix decomposition techniques to form a global-in-space, time-dependent low-dimensional manifold. While TDB-CUR performs well in homogeneous systems, it may be less well-suited to spatially heterogeneous systems such as turbulent flames, where higher-rank approximations are typically required. The proposed TDB-L-CUR framework introduces two methodological extensions to the baseline approach. First, it applies unsupervised clustering to partition the physical domain into distinct regions, enabling spatially localized manifold construction, thereby reducing the rank required for the reduced-order representation. Second, it incorporates a computational singular perturbation (CSP)-based scheme for identifying and penalizing fast species, allowing for spatio-temporally adaptive mitigation of chemical stiffness. The proposed framework is validated on a hierarchy of test cases, including a one-dimensional premixed flame, a two-dimensional nonpremixed ignition case with vortex interaction, and a three-dimensional turbulent premixed flame. TDB-L-CUR significantly improves accuracy over TDB-CUR while further reducing computational cost. The fully on-the-fly formulation of TDB-L-CUR (i.e., requiring no offline training or prior knowledge) makes it a robust and scalable tool for reduced-order modeling of reactive flows.

Local manifold↗
DOE OSTI2023

Zero-Order Reaction Kinetics (Zero-RK): Enabling the Use of Detailed Chemical Kinetics in Combustion Simulations (CRADA Final Report)

This was a collaborative effort between Lawrence Livermore National Security, LLC (LLNS), as manager and operator of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and Gamma Technologies, LLC (GT or Participante), to incorporate the ability to access LLNL chemical kinetics technologies while using GT-SUITE, GT’s market leading engine simulation software. At the end of the project, LLNL has released Zero-RK version 3.5 with zero- and one-dimensional (0-D and 1-D) solver functionality that interfaces with GT’s GT-SUITE v2023 and later releases. GT has tested its product to assure their customers that the interface can provide reduction in chemistry solution time for detailed chemistry simulations. The process has also positioned GT to easily benefit from future improvements of the Zero-RK suite of tools developed under the DOE Vehicle Technologies Office.

33 ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS↗
DOE OSTI2026

Zero Order Reactioin Kinetics: Enabling the use of Detailed Chemical Kinetics in Combustion Simulations (Final CRADA Report)

This was a collaborative effort between Lawrence Livermore National Security, LLC (LLNS), as manager and operator of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and Gamma Technologies, LLC (GT or Participante), to incorporate the ability to access LLNL chemical kinetics technologies while using GT-SUITE, GT’s market leading engine simulation software. At the end of the project, LLNL has released Zero-RK version 3.5 with zero- and one-dimensional (0-D and 1-D) solver functionality that interfaces with GT’s GT-SUITE v2023 and later releases. GT has tested its product to assure their customers that the interface can provide reduction in chemistry solution time for detailed chemistry simulations. The process has also positioned GT to easily benefit from future improvements of the Zero-RK suite of tools developed under the DOE Vehicle Technologies Office.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2021

Enabling Combustion Science Simulations for Future Exascale Machines

Reacting flow simulations for combustion applications require extensive computing capabilities. Leveraging the AMReX library, the Pele suite of combustion simulation tools targets the largest supercomputers available and future exascale machines. We introduce PeleC, the compressible solver in the Pele suite, and detail its capabilities, including complex geometry representation, chemistry integration, and discretization. We present a comparison of development efforts using both OpenACC and AMReX's C++ performance portability framework for execution on multiple GPU architectures. We discuss relevant details that have allowed PeleC to achieve high performance and scalability. PeleC's performance characteristics are measured through relevant simulations on multiple supercomputers. The success of PeleC's design for exascale is exhibited through demonstration of a 160 billion cell simulation and weak scaling onto 100\% of Summit, an NVIDIA-based GPU supercomputer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Our results provide confidence that PeleC will enable future combustion science simulations with unprecedented fidelity.

combustion↗
DOE OSTI2022

PeleC: An adaptive mesh refinement solver for compressible reacting flows

Reacting flow simulations for combustion applications require extensive computing capabilities. Leveraging the AMReX library, the Pele suite of combustion simulation tools targets the largest supercomputers available and future exascale machines. We introduce PeleC, the compressible solver in the Pele suite, and detail its capabilities, including complex geometry representation, chemistry integration, and discretization. We present a comparison of development efforts using both OpenACC and AMReX’s C++ performance portability framework for execution on multiple GPU architectures. We discuss relevant details that have allowed PeleC to achieve high performance and scalability. PeleC’s performance characteristics are measured through relevant simulations on multiple supercomputers. The success of PeleC’s design for exascale is exhibited through demonstration of a 160 billion cell simulation and weak scaling onto 100% of Summit, an NVIDIA-based GPU supercomputer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Our results provide confidence that PeleC will enable future combustion science simulations with unprecedented fidelity.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
NASA NTRS1974

Aerodynamic drag and fuel spreading measurements in a simulated scramjet combustion module

The drag of a simulated scramjet combustion module was measured at Mach 2, 2.5, and 3. The combustor was rectangular in cross section and incorporated six swept fuel injector struts. The effect of strut leading edge radius, position of maximum thickness, thickness ratio, sweep angle, and strut length on the drag was determined. Reduction in thickness ratio had the largest effect on drag reduction. Sweeping the struts upstream yielded the same drag as sweeping the struts downstream and potentially offers the advantages of increased mixing time for the fuel. Helium injection was used to simulate hydrogen fuel. The interstrut spacing required to achieve good distribution of fuel was was found to be about 10 jet diameters. The contribution of helium injection to drag reduction was small.

Povinelli, L. A.↗
NASA NTRS2006

Use, Assessment, and Improvement of the Loci-CHEM CFD Code for Simulation of Combustion in a Single Element GO2/GH2 Injector and Chamber

This document is a viewgraph presentation of a paper that documents a continuing effort at Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) to use, assess, and continually improve CFD codes to the point of material utility in the design of rocket engine combustion devices. This paper describes how the code is presently being used to simulate combustion in a single element combustion chamber with shear coaxial injectors using gaseous oxygen and gaseous hydrogen propellants. The ultimate purpose of the efforts documented is to assess and further improve the Loci-CHEM code and the implementation of it. Single element shear coaxial injectors were tested as part of the Staged Combustion Injector Technology (SCIT) program, where detailed chamber wall heat fluxes were measured. Data was taken over a range of chamber pressures for propellants injected at both ambient and elevated temperatures. Several test cases are simulated as part of the effort to demonstrate use of the Loci-CHEM CFD code and to enable us to make improvements in the code as needed. The simulations presented also include a grid independence study on hybrid grids. Several two-equation eddy viscosity low Reynolds number turbulence models are also evaluated as part of the study. All calculations are presented with a comparison to the experimental data. Weaknesses of the code relative to test data are discussed and continuing efforts to improve the code are presented.

Westra, Douglas G.↗
NASA NTRS1989

Numerical simulations in combustion

This paper reviews numerical simulations in reacting flows in general and combustion phenomena in particular. It is shown that use of implicit schemes and/or adaptive mesh strategies can improve convergence, stability, and accuracy of the solution. Difficulties increase as turbulence and multidimensions are considered, particularly when finite-rate chemistry governs the given combustion problem. Particular attention is given to the areas of solid-propellant combustion dynamics, turbulent diffusion flames, and spray droplet vaporization.

Chung, T. J.↗
NASA NTRS2001

NASA National Combustion Code Simulations

A systematic effort is in progress to further validate the National Combustion Code (NCC) that has been developed at NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC) for comprehensive modeling and simulation of aerospace combustion systems. The validation efforts include numerical simulation of the gas-phase combustor experiments conducted at the Center for Turbulence Research (CTR), Stanford University, followed by comparison and evaluation of the computed results with the experimental data. Presently, at GRC, a numerical model of the experimental gaseous combustor is built to simulate the experimental model. The constructed numerical geometry includes the flow development sections for air annulus and fuel pipe, 24 channel air and fuel swirlers, hub, combustor, and tail pipe. Furthermore, a three-dimensional multi-block, multi-grid grid (1.6 million grid points, 3-levels of multi-grid) is generated. Computational simulation of the gaseous combustor flow field operating on methane fuel has started. The computational domain includes the whole flow regime starting from the fuel pipe and the air annulus, through the 12 air and 12 fuel channels, in the combustion region and through the tail pipe.

Iannetti, Anthony↗
NASA NTRS2003

Simulation of Combustion Systems with Realistic g-jitter

In this project a transient, fully three-dimensional computer simulation code was developed to simulate the effects of realistic g-jitter on a number of combustion systems. The simulation code is capable of simulating flame spread on a solid and nonpremixed or premixed gaseous combustion in nonturbulent flow with simple combustion models. Simple combustion models were used to preserve computational efficiency since this is meant to be an engineering code. Also, the use of sophisticated turbulence models was not pursued (a simple Smagorinsky type model can be implemented if deemed appropriate) because if flow velocities are large enough for turbulence to develop in a reduced gravity combustion scenario it is unlikely that g-jitter disturbances (in NASA's reduced gravity facilities) will play an important role in the flame dynamics. Acceleration disturbances of realistic orientation, magnitude, and time dependence can be easily included in the simulation. The simulation algorithm was based on techniques used in an existing large eddy simulation code which has successfully simulated fire dynamics in complex domains. A series of simulations with measured and predicted acceleration disturbances on the International Space Station (ISS) are presented. The results of this series of simulations suggested a passive isolation system and appropriate scheduling of crew activity would provide a sufficiently "quiet" acceleration environment for spherical diffusion flames.

Mell, William E.↗