Research
Thermal management of batteries in electric vehicles (EVs) is crucial for ensuring safety, performance, and battery life. Developing a reliable system and an efficient control strategy requires high-fidelity models for the electrical and thermal systems of the battery. We employ a data-driven approach to develop a system-level model of the battery and its cooling circuit.
A fuel surrogate is a simplified model fuel designed to replicate the combustion characteristics of a specific real transportation fuel. It plays a vital role in accurately representing complex fuels within computational systems. Our approach involves an optimization-based method to determine the composition of selected components, resulting in a mixture that closely matches the combustion properties of the target fuel. Additionally, we actively seek out new hydrocarbons that can serve as surrogate components for next generation surrogates, and explore innovative approaches to address the challenges associated with multi-objective surrogate optimization.
A 3D CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) model is a widely utilized computational tool that allows for the visualization and analysis of the intricate interactions between fluid flow and chemistry within reacting flows. This modeling approach provides high-resolution temporal and spatial data, which is crucial for comprehensively studying the physical and chemical processes and optimizing practical energy conversion devices. Our work involves the development of 3D models for both simple reactors (such as counterflow flame burners and constant volume spray chambers) and complex combustion systems (including internal combustion engines). Furthermore, these CFD models are utilized to establish boundary conditions for more advanced computational techniques like kinetic Monte Carlo simulations. They also enable the execution of numerical experiments that would be impractical to conduct with actual systems.
Efficiency and pollutant emissions in energy conversion devices are governed by combustion chemistry. In order to achieve more efficient and cleaner energy conversion processes, it is essential to have a fundamental understanding of the chemical pathways and kinetics involved. Our approach involves conducting detailed kinetic simulations to examine how combustion chemistry affects different phenomena such as ignition delay, heat release characteristics, and pollutant formation. These simulations allow us to gain insights toward the development of more efficient and environmentally friendly processes.