In this first installment of a 14-part series of monthly articles, The Combustion Institute recognizes the 2017 Distinguished Papers selected from among the scientific papers presented during the 36th International Symposium on Combustion. Congratulations to A. Urbano, Q. Douasbin, L. Selle, G. Staffelbach, B. Cuenot, T. Schmitt, S. Ducruix, and S. Candel for winning the DPA in the Spray, Droplet and Supercritical Combustion colloquium.
The authoritative paper, Study of flame response to transverse acoustic modes from the LES of a 42-injector rocket engine, has significantly progressed research in combustion instabilities, especially as applied to rocket propulsion. The paper shows for the first time how individual flames contribute to combustion instability, the constructive coupling between acoustics and combustion. A broader success of the study is the ability to predict stable and unstable operating conditions via numerical simulations.
The outcomes of the paper can lead to a more efficient rocket engine design, a substantial benefit to the space propulsion industries. The scientific team’s research provides a greater qualitative understanding of the physical mechanisms that drive the response of flames to transverse combustion instabilities and how to mitigate those occurrences.
The computational power required for the study is still too large for industrial applications. The scientific team used 80 million CPU hours from the computing center at CINECA, Italy through the Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe (PRACE). In the long-term, however, the research shows that such simulations have the potential for becoming a daily-used industrial design tool. The proper modelling of the combustion given by the detailed simulation provides a path for development of so-called low-order models, which are computationally light while remaining accurate.
The scientific team’s work was mainly conducted in France at the Institute of Fluid Mechanics of Toulouse (IMFT), and in collaboration with colleagues from CERFACS, Toulouse and École Centrale Paris. Research on the paper’s specific configuration started in 2013, however, the team’s efforts on liquid rocket propulsion started in 2006 with the development of the numerical simulation tools.
About 1,300 papers were submitted to the 36th Symposium in 14 combustion science colloquia. Those papers were categorized by teams of colloquium coordinators and co-chairs, and then distributed to approximately 1,000 scientific reviewers. One paper in each discipline was awarded the recognition of Distinguished Paper.
The 14 Distinguished Papers undergo committee review for consideration to receive the Silver Combustion Medal that will be awarded during the 37th International Symposium in Dublin, Ireland. A paper selected for this honor exemplifies quality, achievement, and significance to advance a field of combustion science. Distinguished papers are selected biennially from among the scientific papers presented during the International Symposium on Combustion and accepted for publication in the Proceedings of The Combustion Institute.