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At least 73 records · Page 4
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2025

Direct numerical simulations for hybrid rocket boundary layers: Performance modeling and scaling

This paper presents a comprehensive performance and scaling analysis of direct numerical simulations for reacting boundary layers, focusing on slab burner configurations. Using a PETSc-based finite volume CFD framework, the study evaluates the scalability and computational cost of flow, chemistry, and radiation evaluations across 2D and 3D simulations. Polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) is the fuel with pure O 2 as the oxidizer, modeled using a detailed chemical kinetics mechanism with 113 species and 660 reactions. A ray-tracing-based radiation solver, designed for distributed memory applications, is implemented to model radiation heat transfer. Parallel scalability is analyzed for the coupled flow, chemistry, and radiation heat transfer processes. Weak and strong scaling studies are conducted on up to 15,000 computational ranks, revealing robust performance when flow cells exceed 200 per rank. Chemistry evaluations dominate the computational cost in large 3D simulations, accounting for approximately 40% of the total runtime, while flow processes contribute around 35%, and radiation solver contributions remain below 10% due to reduced evaluation frequencies. GPU accelerated chemistry evaluation, implemented with Zero-RK, demonstrates significant promise, achieving up to a 4x speedup for workloads exceeding 30,000 cells per GPU. However, diminishing returns are observed for smaller workloads due to CPU-GPU communication overhead. This study identifies key challenges, including memory bottlenecks and the effects of domain partitioning on flow scalability, while highlighting the potential of GPU-accelerated chemistry to reduce computational costs. In conclusion, these findings provide realizable run configurations for 2D, 3D, and GPU-accelerated cases, offering insights for optimizing reactive flow solvers.

CFD Scalability↗
DOE OSTI2024

Direct Numerical Simulation Database of High-Speed Flow over Parameterized Curved Walls

This study presents a direct numerical simulation (DNS) database of high-speed turbulent boundary layers (TBLs) subject to pressure gradients due to parametrically varied backward-facing and forward-facing wall curvatures, with an inflow Mach number of 4.9 and a friction Reynolds number of [Formula: see text] immediately before the onset of wall curvature. The Mach and Reynolds numbers are significantly higher than those reported in the literature for the DNS of pressure-gradient TBLs. The flow conditions and baseline wall geometries are representative of experiments in the high-speed blowdown wind tunnel at the National Aerothermochemistry Laboratory at Texas A&M University. The wall steepness of the baseline geometry for both the backward-facing and forward-facing walls was systematically varied to cause attached, incipiently separated, and fully separated flows. Precomputed flow statistics, including turbulent kinetic energy budgets, are available on the website of the Turbulence Modeling Resource of the NASA Langley Research Center, allowing other investigators to query any property of interest.

Engineering↗
NASA NTRS1990

Active turbulence control in wallbounded flow using direct numerical simulations

An exploratory study of concepts for active control of turbulent boundary layers using the direct numerical simulation technique was performed. Significant drag reduction was achieved when the surface boundary condition was modified such that it could suppress the large-scale structures present in the wall region. This was achieved by prescribing the normal component of velocity at the wall to be 180 deg out of phase with the normal velocity slightly above the wall at each instant. The drag reduction was accompanied with significant reduction in the intensity of the wall-layer structures and reductions in the magnitude of Reynolds stresses throughout the flow. Suitability of wall-pressure and shear-stress fluctuations for detection of flow structures above the wall was examined. A preliminary result obtained by applying the present control strategy to a transitional flow is also briefly described, from which one can infer a possible linkage between the control strategy and flow stability.

Kim, J.↗
NASA NTRS1979

Direct numerical simulations of the turbulent wake of an axisymmetric body

The paper presents comparisons of results of direct numerical simulations of turbulence with both laboratory data and self-similarity theory for the case of the turbulent wakes of towed, axisymmetric bodies. In general, the agreement of the simulation results with both the laboratory data and the self-similarity theory is good, although the comparisons are hampered by inadequate procedures for initializing the numerical simulations.

Riley, J. J.↗
NASA NTRS1994

Scalability study of parallel spatial direct numerical simulation code on IBM SP1 parallel supercomputer

The implementation and the performance of a parallel spatial direct numerical simulation (PSDNS) code are reported for the IBM SP1 supercomputer. The spatially evolving disturbances that are associated with laminar-to-turbulent in three-dimensional boundary-layer flows are computed with the PS-DNS code. By remapping the distributed data structure during the course of the calculation, optimized serial library routines can be utilized that substantially increase the computational performance. Although the remapping incurs a high communication penalty, the parallel efficiency of the code remains above 40% for all performed calculations. By using appropriate compile options and optimized library routines, the serial code achieves 52-56 Mflops on a single node of the SP1 (45% of theoretical peak performance). The actual performance of the PSDNS code on the SP1 is evaluated with a 'real world' simulation that consists of 1.7 million grid points. One time step of this simulation is calculated on eight nodes of the SP1 in the same time as required by a Cray Y/MP for the same simulation. The scalability information provides estimated computational costs that match the actual costs relative to changes in the number of grid points.

Hanebutte, Ulf R.↗
NASA NTRS2018

Direct Numerical Simulation of Receptivity to Roughness in a Swept-Wing Boundary Layer at High Reynolds Numbers

Direct numerical simulations (DNS) are performed to examine the receptivity to roughness in a spatially developing three-dimensional boundary layer over an in finite-swept natural-laminar-flow wing at a free stream Mach number of 0:75 and a chord Reynolds number of approximately 25 million based on the long, swept chord. Stationary cross ow disturbances are excited by applying either critically spaced discrete cylinders of micron size or naturally occurring distributed roughness in the leading-edge region. The DNS data show that the spanwise spectral content of the excited cross ow disturbances is highly dependent upon the shape of roughness elements, and the initial growth of the cross ow structures is a nonlinear function of the element height. The linear growth rate of the excited cross ow disturbances predicted by DNS shows good agreement with linear parabolized stability equations. The receptivity study lays the foundation for investigating the stabilization of the naturally most unstable steady cross ow mode by using spanwise periodic DREs.

Nicholson, Gary↗
NASA NTRS1993

Critical comparison of second-order closures with direct numerical simulations of homogeneous turbulence

Recently, several models have been proposed for closing the second-moment equations, in which the velocity-pressure gradient tensor and the dissipation rate tensor are two of the most important terms. In the literature, these correlation tensors are usually decomposed into a so-called rapid term and a return-to-isotropy term. Models of these terms have been used in global flow calculations together with other modeled terms. However, their individual behaviors in different flows have not been fully examined because they are unmeasurable in the laboratory. Recently, the development of direct numerical simulation (DNS) of turbulence has given us the possibility to do this kind of study. With direct numerical simulation, we may use the solution to calculate exactly the values of these correlation terms and then directly compare them with the values from their modeled formulations. In this paper, we make direct comparisons of five representative rapid models and eight return-to-isotropy models using the DNS data of 45 homogeneous flows, which were done by Rogers et al. (1986) and Lee and Reynolds (1985). The purpose of these direct comparisons is to explore the performance of these models in different flows and identify the ones that give the best performance. The paper also describes the modeling procedure, model constraints, and the various evaluated models. The detailed results of the direct comparisons are discussed, and a few concluding remarks on turbulence models are given.

Shih, Tsan-Hsing↗
DOE OSTI2024

Direct numerical simulation of a high-pressure hydrogen micromix combustor: Flame structure and stabilisation mechanism

A high-pressure hydrogen micromix combustor has been investigated using direct numerical simulation with detailed chemistry to examine the flame structure and stabilisation mechanism. The configuration of the combustor was based on the design by Schefer et al., using numerical periodicity to mimic a large square array. A precursor simulation of an opposed jet-in-crossflow was first conducted to generate appropriate partially-premixed inflow boundary conditions for the subsequent reacting simulation. The resulting flame can be described as an predominantly-lean inhomogeneously-premixed lifted jet flame. Five main zones were identified: a jet mixing region, a core flame, a peripheral flame, a recirculation zone, and combustion products. The core flame, situated over the jet mixing region, was found to burn as a thin reaction front, responsible for over 85% of the total fuel consumption. The peripheral flame shrouded the core flame, had low mean flow with high turbulence, and burned at very lean conditions (in the distributed burning regime). It was shown that turbulent premixed flame propagation was an order-of-magnitude too slow to stabilise the flame at these conditions. Stabilisation was identified to be due to ignition events resulting from turbulent mixing of fuel from the jet into mean recirculation of very lean hot products. Ignition events were found to correlate with shear-driven Kelvin-Helmholtz vortices, and increased in likelihood with streamwise distance. At the flame base, isolated events were observed, which developed into rapidly burning flame kernels that were blown downstream. Further downstream, near-simultaneous spatially-distributed ignition events were observed, which appeared more like ignition sheets. The paper concludes with a broader discussion that considers generalising from the conditions considered here.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
NASA NTRS1991

A critical comparison of second order closures with direct numerical simulation of homogeneous turbulence

Recently, several second order closure models have been proposed for closing the second moment equations, in which the velocity-pressure gradient (and scalar-pressure gradient) tensor and the dissipation rate tensor are two of the most important terms. In the literature, these correlation tensors are usually decomposed into a so called rapid term and a return-to-isotropy term. Models of these terms have been used in global flow calculations together with other modeled terms. However, their individual behavior in different flows have not been fully examined because they are un-measurable in the laboratory. Recently, the development of direct numerical simulation (DNS) of turbulence has given us the opportunity to do this kind of study. With the direct numerical simulation, we may use the solution to exactly calculate the values of these correlation terms and then directly compare them with the values from their modeled formulations (models). Here, we make direct comparisons of five representative rapid models and eight return-to-isotropy models using the DNS data of forty five homogeneous flows which were done by Rogers et al. (1986) and Lee et al. (1985). The purpose of these direct comparisons is to explore the performance of these models in different flows and identify the ones which give the best performance. The modeling procedure, model constraints, and the various evaluated models are described. The detailed results of the direct comparisons are discussed, and a few concluding remarks on turbulence models are given.

Shih, Tsan-Hsing↗
NASA NTRS2011

Direct Numerical Simulations of Transitional/Turbulent Wakes

The interest in transitional/turbulent wakes spans the spectrum from an intellectual pursuit to understand the complex underlying physics to a critical need in aeronautical engineering and other disciplines to predict component/system performance and reliability. Cylinder wakes have been studied extensively over several decades to gain a better understanding of the basic flow phenomena that are encountered in such flows. Experimental, computational and theoretical means have been employed in this effort. While much has been accomplished there are many important issues that need to be resolved. The physics of the very near wake of the cylinder (less than three diameters downstream) is perhaps the most challenging of them all. This region comprises the two detached shear layers, the recirculation region and wake flow. The interaction amongst these three components is to some extent still a matter of conjecture. Experimental techniques have generated a large percentage of the data that have provided us with the current state of understanding of the subject. More recently computational techniques have been used to simulate cylinder wakes, and the data from such simulations are being used to both refine our understanding of such flows as well as provide new insights. A few large eddy and direct numerical simulations (LES and DNS) of cylinder wakes have appeared in the literature in the recent past. These investigations focus on the low Reynolds number range where the cylinder boundary layer is laminar (sub-critical range). However, from an engineering point of view, there is considerable interest in the situation where the upper and/or lower boundary layer of an airfoil is turbulent, and these turbulent boundary layers separate from the airfoil to contribute to the formation of the wake downstream. In the case of cylinders, this only occurs at relatively large unit Reynolds numbers. However, in the case of airfoils, the boundary layer has the opportunity to transition to turbulence on the airfoil surface at a relatively lower unit Reynolds number because the characteristic length of the airfoil is typically one to two orders of magnitude larger than the trailing edge diameter. This transition to turbulence would occur unless there is a strong favorable pressure gradient that results in the boundary layer remaining laminar or transitional over the surface of the airfoil. This presentation will focus on two direct numerical simulations that have been performed at NASA ARC. The first is of a cylinder wake with laminar separating boundary layers. The second is the wake of a flat plate with a circular trailing edge. The upper and lower plate surface boundary layers are both turbulent and statistically identical. Thus the computed wake is symmetric in a statistical sense. This flow is more representative of airfoil wakes than cylinder wakes. Results from the two simulations including flow visualization and turbulence statistics in the near wake will be presented at the seminar.

wakes↗
DOE OSTI2024

Direct numerical simulations of three-component Rayleigh–Taylor mixing and an improved model for multicomponent reacting mixtures

We present direct numerical simulations of a three-layer Rayleigh–Taylor instability (RTI) problem with a configuration based on the experiments of Suchandra & Ranjan ( J. Fluid Mech. , vol. 974, 2023, A35) and Jacobs & Dalziel ( J. Fluid Mech. , vol. 542, 2005, pp. 251–279). The problem consists of a layer of light fluid between two layers of heavy fluid with an Atwood number of 0.3. These simulations are first validated through comparison with available experimental data. The validated simulations are then utilized to analyse statistics in this three-component flow. First, length scales are examined utilizing spectra and two-point spatial correlations of velocity and species concentration fluctuations. Next, joint probability density functions (p.d.f.s) of species concentration are compared against several model p.d.f.s representing generalizations of the bivariate beta distribution. Notably, the joint p.d.f.s do not appear to be accurately described by a Dirichlet distribution, indicating the marginal distributions do not conform to a beta distribution. Finally, similarity of the present configuration to three-component mixing found in inertial confinement fusion (ICF) applications is exploited to develop and validate an improved model for the impact of multicomponent mixing on thermonuclear (TN) reaction rates. A single time instant from the present simulations is chosen for a TN burn calculation under the hypothetical assumption of ICF materials and temperatures. Total TN output from this second calculation is then compared against the prediction of the improved model. The new model is found to accurately predict TN reaction rates in both premixed and non-premixed configurations.

42 ENGINEERING↗
NASA NTRS1993

Analysis of direct numerical simulation data of a Mach 4.5 transitional boundary-layer flow

This paper describes the creation, by temporal direct numerical simulation and the analysis based on the Reynolds stress transport equations, of a high-quality data set that represents the laminar-turbulent transition of a high-speed boundary-layer flow. Following Pruett and Zang (1992), and with the help of algorithmic refinements, the evolution of an axial, Mach 4.5 boundary-layer flow along a hollow cylinder is simulated numerically. Favre-averaged Reynolds stress transport equations are derived in generalized curvilinear coordinates and are then specialized to the cylindrical geometry at hand. Reynolds stresses and various turbulence quantities, such as turbulent kinetic energy and turbulent Mach number, are calculated from the numerical data at various stages of the transition process. The kinetic energy 'budgets' are constructed from the transport equations. Various contributing terms for the evolution of kinetic energy, like the rates of production and dissipation, transport, and diffusion, are presented. The compressible dissipation rate is small in comparison with the solenoidal dissipation rate for all times. The pressure-dilatation term is of the same order of magnitude as the compressible dissipation rate.

Dinavahi, Surya P. G.↗
NASA NTRS1994

Direct numerical simulation of transition: The spatial approach

The objective of this paper is to review the efforts in spatial direct numerical simulations for transition modeling. Much recent success has been realized in the development of more efficient numerical algorithms as well as a robust downstream boundary condition. Efforts at explaining complex physical phenomena through the use of simulations are reviewed.

Reed, Helen L.↗
NASA NTRS1997

Efficient Parallel Algorithm For Direct Numerical Simulation of Turbulent Flows

A distributed algorithm for a high-order-accurate finite-difference approach to the direct numerical simulation (DNS) of transition and turbulence in compressible flows is described. This work has two major objectives. The first objective is to demonstrate that parallel and distributed-memory machines can be successfully and efficiently used to solve computationally intensive and input/output intensive algorithms of the DNS class. The second objective is to show that the computational complexity involved in solving the tridiagonal systems inherent in the DNS algorithm can be reduced by algorithm innovations that obviate the need to use a parallelized tridiagonal solver.

Moitra, Stuti↗
NASA NTRS2024

Direct Numerical Simulation of Smooth-Body Flow Separation Around a Ramp

Spanwise-periodic computation of a turbulent flow past a two-dimensional smooth ramp geometry is performed in the form of a direct numerical simulation. The Reynolds number based on the ramp height is about 147,000. A straight section that precedes the smooth ramp allows the incoming turbulent boundary layer to grow under a weak favorable pressure gradient. The boundary layer introduced at the domain inlet has a momentum-thickness based Reynolds number of 2000. The turbulent boundary layer nearing the ramp first interacts with a relatively stronger favorable pressure gradient, followed by a strong adverse pressure gradient. Consequently, the boundary layer experiences a modest acceleration before decelerating and separating. Analysis of the data over this region hints at the formation of an internal layer beneath the accelerated boundary layer. The analysis also reveals that this internal layer forms the origin of the free shear layer that emerges in the deceleration region and separates. The streamwise extent of the separated region is comparable to the ramp length, while the viscous layer thickness near reattachment is about the same as the ramp height; hence, the boundary layer undergoing separation and subsequent reattachment in the present configuration experiences its thickness being amplified by about tenfold. The reattached flow continues to develop further under a diminishing pressure gradient in the recovery region in a similar fashion to a zero pressure gradient turbulent boundary layer.

Turbulence↗
NASA NTRS1990

Direct Numerical Simulations of Turbulent Convection: Variable Gravity and Uniform Rotation - Part 1

Turbulent convection may have played a major role in determining the structure and evolution of the primordial solar nebula, but current, incomplete models of convection and turbulence give very different results and remain largely untested in the absence of detailed astronomical observations. Numerical simulations provide an 'experimental' database for comparison with these models, and, to this end, direct numerical simulations of turbulent convection were performed with modifications intended to mimic some of the unique physical features of thin accretion disks, such as the primordial solar nebula: internal heating, a gravitational acceleration that is linearly proportional to the distance from midplane of the nebula, and rapid rotation. Peclet numbers in the simulations are comparable to those in solar nebula models; Rossby numbers in the simulations are an order of magnitude larger than those in solar nebula models because of the unrealistically high Prandtl and low, Reynolds numbers required to resolve all scales of the convective flow. We find that, despite the loss of buoyancy at midplane, turbulent motions easily penetrate the midplane region with little loss of intensity, providing efficient transport of heat and turbulent kinetic energy throughout the interior. A simple mixing length model modified to include rotation is found to give convective heat fluxes for the interior flow in rough agreement with the numerical simulations. We discuss these preliminary results with regard to assumptions about heating distributions and convective heat fluxes made in standard solar nebula models. More definitive comparisons with solar nebula modelling will become possible when more realistic effects of shear, density, stratification, and compression are included.

Cabot, W.↗
NASA NTRS1994

Direct numerical simulations of leading-edge receptivity for freestream sound

The objective of this paper is to review our efforts in spatial direct numerical simulations for modeling leading-edge receptivity to freestream sound and vorticity. These results begin to provide the link between the freestream and the initial boundary-layer response and can provide the upstream conditions for further simulations marching through the transition process toward turbulence.

Fuciarelli, David A.↗