Scientific and Technological Advances in Hydrogen Combustion Aircraft

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

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 15 June 2025 | Viewed by 623

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
Department of Mechanical, Aerospace, and Biomedical Engineering, University of Tennessee Space Institute, 411 B. H. Goethert Pkwy, Tullahoma, TN 37388, USA
Interests: combustion; hydrogen; mixing; turbulence; swirl; premixed; partially-premixed; stratified; flame displacement speed; cryogenic; cryogenic distillation; separation; aviation; aircraft; swirler; heat exchanger; injector; combustor; jet engine; fluid mechanics; flame stabilization; acoustics; combustion instability; flow decompositions; fuel burn reduction

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Mitigating the climate change trajectory is a major challenge across the globe. Advancing the future state of aviation with decarbonized aircraft operated with hydrogen fuel is thus important in this worldwide effort. To meet the future deployment of clean, decarbonized, safe, and efficient thermal-powered aircraft in civil aviation, research on fundamental processes and mechanisms at work in aviation technologies is required to improve them. New concepts can be developed and investigated to open new routes as well. Typical operating conditions (operating pressure and inlet temperature) of interest encompass atmospheric and engine-relevant conditions (1 atm, 35 atm) (295 K, 750 K) . Liquid cryogenic injections are of interest. This Special Issue is focused on scientific and technological research for hydrogen combustion subsonic aircraft. Contributions that advance efficiency gains across flow processes and/or technologies are of interest. Submissions of interest include, but are not limited to, contributions to the following four topics in particular: (1) fundamental physico-chemical progresses such as chemical kinetic mechanism development, flame speed studies, cryogenic thermodynamics and transport data, turbulence versus preferential diffusion effects in hydrogen combustion, and autoignition studies; (2) design studies associated with a technological component such as fuel distribution system parts, gaseous or cryogenic insulated tanks, flow over turbine blades, heat transfer in heat exchanger, O2/N2 separation processes including cryogenic distillation, mixing in injector, flashback and flame arrester, and flow–swirler–flame interactions; (3) aircraft system-level design studies for performance assessment, fuel burn calculations, optimized aircraft range, and studies for improved routes/operations; and (4) laboratory-scale and open access complex geometry injector and combustor investigations including thermal-to-kinetic energy conversion, flame stabilization, and combustion instability. This Special Issue is seeking experimental, computational, or theoretical contributions in these four areas. Innovative methods including machine learning or big data tools will be considered. Incremental advances and disruptive concept contributions will be reviewed.

Dr. Paul Palies
Guest Editor

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Keywords

  • combustion
  • hydrogen
  • mixing
  • turbulence
  • swirl
  • premixed
  • partially premixed
  • stratified
  • flame displacement speed
  • cryogenic
  • cryogenic distillation
  • separation
  • aviation
  • aircraft
  • swirler
  • heat exchanger
  • injector
  • combustor
  • jet engine
  • fluid mechanics
  • flame stabilization
  • acoustics
  • combustion instability
  • fuel burn

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

17 pages, 13877 KiB  
Article
Experimental–Numerical Comparison of H2–Air Detonations: Influence of N2 Chemistry and Diffusion Effects
by Vigneshwaran Sankar, Karl P. Chatelain and Deanna A. Lacoste
Aerospace 2025, 12(4), 297; https://doi.org/10.3390/aerospace12040297 - 31 Mar 2025
Viewed by 173
Abstract
This study evaluates the performance of two-dimensional (2D) detonation simulations against recent experimental measurements for a stoichiometric hydrogen–air mixture at 25 kPa. The validation parameters rely on the average cell size (λ), the cell size variability (2σ/λ [...] Read more.
This study evaluates the performance of two-dimensional (2D) detonation simulations against recent experimental measurements for a stoichiometric hydrogen–air mixture at 25 kPa. The validation parameters rely on the average cell size (λ), the cell size variability (2σ/λ), and the dynamics of both the relative detonation speed (D/DCJ) and the local induction zone length (Δi) along the cell cycle. We select Mével 2017’s and San Diego’s chemical models for 2D simulations, after evaluating 13 chemical models with Zeldovich–von Neumann–Döring (ZND) simulations. From this model selection, the effects of nitrogen chemistry and diffusion (Navier–Stokes or Euler equations) are evaluated on the validation parameters. The main findings are as follows: the simulations conducted with the Mével 2017 (with N2 chemistry) model provide the best agreement with λmeanexp (≈17%), while the experimental cell variability (2σ/λ) is reproduced within 20% by most simulation cases. This model (Mével 2017 with N2 chemistry) also presents good agreement with both the Δi and D/DCJ dynamics, whereas San Diego’s simulations under-predict them along the cell. Interestingly, the speed decay along the cell length exhibits self-similar behavior across all cases, suggesting independence from cell size variability, unlike the Δi dynamics. Finally, this study demonstrates the minimal impact of the diffusion on the simulation results. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Scientific and Technological Advances in Hydrogen Combustion Aircraft)
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