The Combustion Institute and Elsevier, with the assistance of an award committee, have selected Nicolas Noiray, Assistant Professor, ETH Zürich, Switzerland, to receive the third annual Hiroshi Tsuji Early Career Researcher Award and prize of US $10,000. Dr. Noiray has received this prestigious award for his significant contributions and research in combustion dynamics, thermo-acoustic instabilities, and gas turbine combustion engineering.

Co-sponsored by The Combustion Institute and Elsevier, the international award recognizes an early career researcher who has made a significant contribution to advance a specific field of research within four to ten years of completing a doctoral degree or equivalent. The award is named after Professor Hiroshi Tsuji, whose stable porous cylinder counterflow burner configuration has influenced fundamental studies and applications in laminar and turbulent combustion.

“Being the third recipient of the Tsuji Award, after Adam Steinberg in 2016 and Matthias Ihme in 2017, is really fantastic,” said Dr. Noiray. “It is a great honor for me, and I will do my best to live up to this award by continuing to promote combustion research and advancing the aims of The Combustion Institute. I am fortunate for all of the mentors and collaborators that I have worked with during my career as well as the excellent students in my current group and I view this award as a recognition of all of our research efforts. This award will contribute to the development of new experimental platforms and educational outreach.”

Dr. Noiray established the Combustion and Acoustics for Power and Propulsion Systems (CAPS) laboratory at ETH Zürich in August 2014. His duties as assistant professor consist of research and teaching activities in fluid mechanics, combustion, acoustics, thermo-acoustics and aero-acoustics. His fundamental and applied research projects are supported by ETH Zürich, the Swiss National Science Foundation, the European Union Projects Office, and by industrial partners. Dr. Noiray’s research team is currently composed of five Ph.D. students and two postdoctoral researchers. He also supervises B.Sc and M.Sc. students who work on projects in the laboratory. He currently teaches courses in combustion and acoustics to undergraduate and graduate students.

The CAPS laboratory is engaged in research activities aimed at addressing fundamental and practical problems that are relevant for the development of workable, efficient, robust, and sustainable technologies in the energy and transport sectors. Dr. Noiray’s research team focuses on reacting and non-reacting flow control and on the reduction of CO2, pollutants and noise emissions. Their work is based on theoretical modeling, experiments and numerical simulations.

In 2007, Dr. Noiray obtained his Ph.D. from École Centrale Paris, and then accepted an engineering role with Alstom in Switzerland, where he excelled in his research to model and control combustion instabilities induced by thermo-acoustic coupling, and in the development of new combustion technologies. In 2014, he accepted a position as assistant professor at ETH Zürich, where his research and teaching activities have made him a promising professor in combustion science.

“In our third year of the annual Hiroshi Tsuji Early Career Researcher Award, I am pleased to see such exceptional research from so many early career researchers,” said The Combustion Institute President James F. Driscoll. “As our international community continues to grow, the work of Dr. Nicolas Noiray shows us much promise for the future of combustion science.”

“I am thrilled to see the Hiroshi Tsuji Early Career Researcher Award continue into its third year,” said Elsevier Executive Publisher, Yan Sun. “Young researchers represent the future of combustion science, and Elsevier is honoured to continue co-sponsoring this prestigious award with The Combustion Institute. Congratulations to Dr. Noiray.”

Dr. Noiray will be recognized for receiving the Hiroshi Tsuji Early Career Researcher Award during the 37th International Symposium on Combustion in Dublin, Ireland from Sunday, 29 July through Friday, 3 August 2018.

Questions regarding the award may be directed to: Office@CombustionInstitute.org.