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Multiscale Fluid and Plasma Dynamics using Particles

Project description

Multiscale models that enable us to see the forest by looking at the trees

From satellites in space to advanced coating processes and nanofluidic devices, flows of fluids and plasmas are of critical importance on multiple scales. The specific condition of non-equilibrium flow is particularly important given its potential for unexpected and undesired outcomes, while it is difficult to describe mathematically. The EU-funded MEDUSA project is investigating what happens in fluids and plasmas, and how they affect other materials whether in microscopic volumes and systems or in ones we can see with telescopes. Taking advantage of ever-increasing computing power, the team is developing novel multiscale models of fluid and plasma flow based on the dynamics of the particles within them.

Objective

In the last decades, non-equilibrium effects in fluid and plasma dynamics have become the major topic for the understanding of the physics behind many applications and important industrial fields.
These applications include mirco- and nano-technologies along with plasma-based coating processes of nano device fabrication itself, where small dimensions lead to non-eq. effects.
But the applications range right up to other key areas, e.g. re-entry flows and flows around satellites, where rarefied gas and high velocities cause non-equilibrium. Furthermore, continuing miniaturization and increase of process energies will lead to non-eq. effects within technologies in the near future e.g. micro- and nano-fabrication, next-generation lithography or various space systems such as electric propulsion or actively electrodynamically shielded re-entry.
At the moment, non-eq. is still a perturbing phenomenon, because experimental measurements are complicated and simulation tools are only available for specialised problems due to the complexity.
The objective is to progress toward particle-based multiscale methods for thermo-chemical non-eq. gas and plasma flows allowing for the first time simulations of the whole range of high-tech applications and maintaining the competitiveness of European future industry.
As the availability of computational resources increases with decreasing prices, particle methods have become a novel attractive, accurate and elegant numerical tool.
This project will connect competences in physics, mathematics, chemistry and computational science and extend the open-source code platform PICLas, resulting in a direct benefit for the simulation community. Finally, as a main contributor in the field of particle-based fluid dynamics and the main developer of PICLas, I am confident to establish these novel methods as the state-of-the-art in research and academia as well as to enable their utilization in industrial applications.

Coordinator

UNIVERSITY OF STUTTGART
Net EU contribution
€ 1 446 125,00
Address
Keplerstrasse 7
70174 Stuttgart
Germany

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Region
Baden-Württemberg Stuttgart Stuttgart, Stadtkreis
Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
Links
Other funding
€ 0,00

Beneficiaries (1)