Dr. Kilian Oberleithner, Dr. Steffen Terhaar, Prof. Christian Oliver Paschereit, and Katharina Kohse-Höinghaus, CI President (2012-2016), at the 36th International Symposium on Combustion in Seoul, Korea
In this fifth installment of a seven-part series of articles, The Combustion Institute recognizes combustion scientists who were honored with medals and awards during the 36th International Symposium on Combustion. Steffen Terhaar, Kilian Oberleithner, and Christian Oliver Paschereit are the 2016 recipients of the Silver Combustion Medal, for the outstanding paper, Key parameters governing the precessing vortex core in reacting flows: An experimental and analytical study, presented at the previous International Symposium on Combustion.
Dr. Steffen Terhaar studied Aeronautical Engineering at the Technical University of Berlin, Germany and the ETSIA Madrid, Spain. In his master’s thesis he developed a flight control system for the automatic landing system of a two-seated utility motor glider. After continuing in the field of flight control for another year as a research assistant, Dr. Terhaar joined the group of Prof. Paschereit at TU Berlin for a Ph.D. in gas turbine combustion. He employed advanced laser diagnostics and analytical modeling to study the flow field and flame-flow field interactions of swirling combustor flows. His main research interests were fuel flexible and heavily diluted combustion systems, as well as the identification, modeling, and control of self-excited and acoustically driven flow instabilities. After Dr. Terhaar received his Ph.D. in 2015, he joined Alstom in Baden, Switzerland. Since the beginning of the GE-Alstom alliance, he is working as a Combustor Development Engineer for GE Switzerland.
Dr. Kilian Oberleithner obtained a master’s degree in Engineering Science from the Technical University of Berlin. His master’s thesis was based on experimental research on swirling jets that he conducted in the laboratory of Prof. Israel Wygnanski, at TU Berlin. He continued researching the instabilities in swirling jets at the same university under the joint supervision of Prof. Oliver Paschereit and Prof. I. Wygnanski. Dr. Oberleithner received his Ph.D. from TU Berlin in 2012 and continued research as a postdoc in Prof. Julio Soria’s group in Melbourne, Australia until 2014. He is currently a research group leader at TU Berlin. His research interests are focused on exploring physical mechanisms and developing flow control techniques for reacting and non-reacting turbulent shear flows in general and in swirl-stabilized combustion and thermoacoustics in particular, using stability theory, laser diagnostics, proper orthogonal decomposition and reduced order modeling.
Prof. Christian Oliver Paschereit has been the Chair of Fluid Dynamics, Hermann-Föttinger-Institut, Technical University of Berlin, Germany, since 2003. His research and teaching covers a broad spectrum of topics related to fluid mechanics and combustion technology: flow and combustion control, vessel aerodynamics, gas turbine technology, ultra-low NOx combustion, thermoacoustics, pressure gain combustion and wind turbine technology. Before moving to TU Berlin, Prof. Paschereit held an upper management position at ABB/Alstom, Switzerland, which he joined in 1994. From 1992 to 1994, he worked on high-speed train acoustics and helped to substantially reduce train noise. After his studies at TU Berlin and École Centrale de Lyon, France, he achieved his Ph.D. from TU Berlin and the University of Arizona. Prof. Paschereit’s scientific and technology achievements are demonstrated by more than 400 journal and conference publications. The research has not only academic interest, but was also important for industrial applications documented in over 75 patent publications. A number of best paper awards, many research pieces, and an ERC Advanced Grant underline his competence in combustion and fluid dynamics.
Please join The Combustion Institute in congratulating the Silver Combustion Medal recipients, and the other honored 2016 award winners in the international combustion community. Questions regarding awards may be directed to: Office@CombustionInstitute.org.