Improvement of aerodynamic performance using thermal fields of localized plasma sources

Abstract

Paper presented at the 8th International Conference on Heat Transfer, Fluid Mechanics and Thermodynamics, Mauritius, 11-13 July, 2011.

Matched numerical and experimental studies are performed in the framework of the developed flow-control concept based on generation of small spanwise-regular disturbances. The idea arose from the analysis of skin-flow interaction of high-speed marine animals. In practice, flow regularity of a given scale is introduced as a temperature boundary condition, T(z). Experimentally, it is realized with spanwise arrays of thermal sources, in particular, in a form of localized plasma discharges generated in a field of microwave radiation. Measured aerodynamic coefficients are shown to correlate with the induced streamwise vortical structure of a boundary layer.