Study of recombination process in non-equilibrium chemical systems

What is it about?

Hypersonic flows are characterized by strong thermochemical non-equilibrium behavior which plays an important role in determining the aerodynamic and thermal loads on the surface of the vehicle. In this work, we have aimed to study the recombination processes for a 0-D isothermal case using ab-initio quantum chemistry based State-to-state approach. The results obtained may be used to develop physics informed reduced-order models in the future.

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Photo by Hermeus on Unsplash

Photo by Hermeus on Unsplash

Why is it important?

One of the largest obstacles in designing light and efficient thermal protection systems for hypersonic vehicles is the lack of understanding of non-equilibrium phenomenon in gas-phase chemistry. In the past, many state-to-state and reduced order models have been developed to capture the non-equilibrium dissociation behavior, however, recombination has not been that extensively studied. Recombination chemistry plays an important role in wakes, expanding regions of the flow and hypersonic boundary layers where it ultimately controls the thermal loads on the vehicle surface. Therefore, it is of utmost importance to accurately understand the non-equilibrium flow behavior in this region. To this end, this work aims to perform State-to-State analysis of recombination processes occurring in N2+N and O2+O chemical systems in a 0-D isothermal reactor. The insights obtained from this analysis may then be leveraged to develop reduced-order models for application to CFD simulations.