MAE T&P Seminar – Reactive Flow in Extreme Scenarios: From Dust Explosions to Explosive Afterburning

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Reactive Flow in Extreme Scenarios: From Dust Explosions to Explosive Afterburning

Dr. Ryan Houim
Assistant Professor
Department of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering
University of Florida

Abstract
Explosions in coal mines, food processing facilities, metal working factories, and even everyday life occur with alarming regularity. Despite a long history of research and its importance to safety and defense applications, the physical mechanisms that govern the ignition and combustion of reactive dust remain relatively unknown. Basic questions such as “What is the impact of thermal radiation on dust explosions?” and “What are the ignition and combustion mechanisms of explosively-dispersed reactive powder?” remain unanswered. My group answers these and other fundamental questions using massively-parallel numerical simulation codes and models developed at the University of Florida by my research group. The results of these simulations demonstrate that shock propagation, granular mechanics, dust dispersal, ignition, and combustion of reactive particles are tightly coupled in highly dynamic processes for both safety and defense applications. In particular, I will discuss results showing the ignition and combustion mechanisms of reactive aluminum particles dispersed by an explosive charge. Recent work exploring the role of thermal radiation on the propagation and severity of dust explosions as well as novel simulations that incorporate detailed real-gas chemical kinetics into explosive afterburning models will also be presented. I will close the discussion with an outline of my group’s ongoing research effort and long-term plans.

Biography
Dr. Houim is an Assistant Professor at the University of Florida. He received a B.S degree in Mechanical Engineering from North Dakota State University in 2004 and a Ph.D. degree in Mechanical Engineering from the Pennsylvania State University in 2011. He was a post-doctoral fellow at the Laboratory for Computational Physics at the Naval Research Laboratory from 2012-2013 and a Research Assistant Scientist at the University of Maryland from 2013-2017. Dr. Houim joined the University of Florida in 2017. He has won numerous awards including a National Research Council Post-Doctoral Fellowship, an AFOSR YIP award, and an NSF CAREER award. His research has focused on a wide range of topics in multiphase flow, combustion, and numerical simulation including model and numerical algorithm development, deflagration-to-detonation transition, dust explosions, propulsion, internal ballistics of gun and rocket systems, and metal particle combustion.

MAE Faculty Host: S. Bala