Recent Advances in Icing Studies and Energy-Efficient De-Icing/Anti-Icing Technologies

A special issue of Aerospace (ISSN 2226-4310). This special issue belongs to the section "Aeronautics".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 25 July 2025 | Viewed by 469

Special Issue Editors

School of Mechatronical Engineering, Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing, China
Interests: computational particle dynamics; sticking and spreading of droplets; particle deposition issues in a variety of engineering applications, from the ‘sky’ (turbomachinery) to the ‘ground’ (boilers/combustors); CFD modelling and uncertainty quantification; instrumentations for particle deposition
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Mechatronical Engineering, Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing, China
Interests: aerodynamics; turbomachinery; multiphase flow; icing

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Liaoning Provincial Key Laboratory of Aircraft Ice Protection, AVIC Aerodynamics Research Institute, Shenyang 110034, China
Interests: aircraft icing and anti/de-icing technology; superhydrophobic surface; ice wind tunnel test; numerical simulation of aircraft icing

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Low Speed Aerodynamics Institute, China Aerodynamics Research and Development Center, Mianyang 621000, China
Interests: aircraft icing; drop impact; multiphase flow; heat transfer

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Icing poses significant challenges in various industrial applications, including aerospace, refrigeration, wind energy, marine operations, and electrical networks. Historically, aircraft icing has played a role in numerous fatal aviation accidents. According to the National Transportation Safety Board of the United States, from 2008 to 2021, an average of four aircraft accidents and five fatalities per year were attributed to in-flight icing. In wind energy, severe icing can reduce annual energy production at wind farm sites by more than 20%. Moreover, with increasing human activities in Arctic regions, icing has been shown to compromise the stability and reliability of marine infrastructure.

To address these challenges, researchers are focusing their efforts toward understanding the icing physics in lab-scale facilities and large-scale wind tunnels and developing advanced numerical models to predict the formation of ice accretion under various conditions. Recent years have also seen the emergence of innovative active and passive de-icing/anti-icing approaches to prevent or remove ice by delaying ice nucleation, retarding ice front propagation, reducing ice adhesion, and promoting melting/drainage.

This Special Issue focuses on recent advances in both experimental and numerical investigations of icing physics, as well as state-of-the-art energy efficient de-icing/anti-icing technologies. This Special Issue invites original research papers, as well as literature reviews. The topics of interest for this Special Issue include (but are not limited to) the following:

  • Icing wind tunnel techniques;
  • Icing detection techniques;
  • SLD and ice crystal generation techniques;
  • Icing physics;
  • Novel icing and de-icing/anti-icing numerical models;
  • Energy efficient de-icing/anti-icing technologies.

Dr. Xin Yang
Dr. Wenqiang Zhang
Dr. Dongyu Zhu
Dr. Ningli Chen
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Aerospace is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • icing
  • de-icing
  • anti-icing
  • SLD
  • ice crystal
  • icing physics
  • icing thermodynamics
  • phase change
  • heat/mass transfer
  • icing wind tunnel
  • icing detection
  • CFD

Benefits of Publishing in a Special Issue

  • Ease of navigation: Grouping papers by topic helps scholars navigate broad scope journals more efficiently.
  • Greater discoverability: Special Issues support the reach and impact of scientific research. Articles in Special Issues are more discoverable and cited more frequently.
  • Expansion of research network: Special Issues facilitate connections among authors, fostering scientific collaborations.
  • External promotion: Articles in Special Issues are often promoted through the journal's social media, increasing their visibility.
  • e-Book format: Special Issues with more than 10 articles can be published as dedicated e-books, ensuring wide and rapid dissemination.

Further information on MDPI's Special Issue policies can be found here.

Published Papers (1 paper)

Order results
Result details
Select all
Export citation of selected articles as:

Research

18 pages, 11147 KiB  
Article
Numerical Study of Wind Tunnel Wall Effects on Icing Cloud Distribution and Water Collection in Aero-Engine Nacelles
by Cong Li, Ningli Chen, Xian Yi and Qingren Lai
Aerospace 2025, 12(4), 335; https://doi.org/10.3390/aerospace12040335 - 13 Apr 2025
Viewed by 244
Abstract
Icing wind tunnel tests play a critical role in evaluating ice accretion on aero-engine nacelles. However, the effects of the wind tunnel wall (WTW) on the dynamics of the icing cloud remain insufficiently quantified. This study employs an experimentally validated Eulerian–Eulerian multiphase approach [...] Read more.
Icing wind tunnel tests play a critical role in evaluating ice accretion on aero-engine nacelles. However, the effects of the wind tunnel wall (WTW) on the dynamics of the icing cloud remain insufficiently quantified. This study employs an experimentally validated Eulerian–Eulerian multiphase approach to quantify WTW-induced alterations in Liquid Water Content (LWC) distribution inside the nacelle and droplet collection efficiency (β) on its surfaces. The results show that the WTW-induced flow deflection redirects droplets toward the outer nacelle surface, leading to an increase in the maximum droplet collection efficiency (βmax) and the total collected water mass on the nacelle under baseline conditions (Mach Number = 0.206) and causing a banded regime of the deviation in LWC. Parametric analysis further shows that higher inflow velocities and Median Volumetric Diameters (MVDs) enhanced the WTW’s effect on the change in LWC inside the nacelle and increased the maximum droplet collection efficiency on the nacelle’s surface. However, the increase in the intake flow rates exhibits a counteracting trend for the effect of the WTW for both the deviation in LWC and the maximum droplet collection efficiency and the total collected water mass. The findings highlight the necessity of accounting for WTW effects in icing wind tunnel testing protocols to improve flight condition extrapolation accuracy. Full article
Show Figures

Figure 1

Back to TopTop