{"id":120030,"date":"2021-05-11T07:16:08","date_gmt":"2021-05-11T11:16:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/news\/?p=120030"},"modified":"2022-07-12T13:17:13","modified_gmt":"2022-07-12T17:17:13","slug":"flying-at-speeds-up-to-mach-16-could-become-reality-with-ucfs-developing-propulsion-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/news\/flying-at-speeds-up-to-mach-16-could-become-reality-with-ucfs-developing-propulsion-system\/","title":{"rendered":"Flying at Speeds up to Mach 17 Could Become Reality with UCF\u2019s Developing Propulsion System"},"content":{"rendered":"
色花堂 researchers<\/a> are building on their technology that could pave the way for hypersonic flight, such as travel from New York to Los Angeles in under 30 minutes.<\/p>\n In their latest research published Monday in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences<\/em>, the researchers discovered a way to stabilize the detonation needed for hypersonic propulsion by creating a special hypersonic reaction chamber for jet engines.<\/p>\n \u201cThere is an intensifying international effort to develop robust propulsion systems for hypersonic and supersonic flight that would allow flight through our atmosphere at very high speeds and also allow efficient entry and exit from planetary atmospheres,\u201d says study co-author Kareem Ahmed, an associate professor in UCF\u2019s Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. \u201cThe discovery of stabilizing a detonation \u2014 the most powerful form of intense reaction and energy release \u2014 has the potential to revolutionize hypersonic propulsion and energy systems.\u201d<\/p>\n The system could allow for air travel at speeds of Mach 6 to 17, which is more than 4,600 to 13,000 miles per hour. The technology harnesses the power of an oblique detonation wave, which they formed by using an angled ramp inside the reaction chamber to create a detonation-inducing shock wave for propulsion.<\/p>\n Unlike rotating detonation waves that spin, oblique detonation waves are stationary and stabilized.<\/p>\n The technology improves jet propulsion engine efficiency so that more power is generated while using less fuel than traditional propulsion engines, thus lightening the fuel load and reducing costs and emissions.<\/p>\n In addition to faster air travel<\/a>, the technology could also be used in rockets for space missions<\/a> to make them lighter by requiring less fuel, travel farther and burn more cleanly.<\/p>\n Detonation propulsion systems have been studied for more than half a century but had not been successful due to the chemical propellants used or the ways they were mixed. Previous work by Ahmed\u2019s group overcame this problem by carefully balancing the rate of the propellants hydrogen and oxygen released into the engine to create the first experimental evidence of a rotating detonation<\/a>.<\/p>\n However, the short duration of the detonation, often occurring for only micro or milliseconds, makes them difficult to study and impractical for use.<\/p>\n In the new study, however, the UCF researchers were able to sustain the duration of a detonation wave for three seconds by creating a new hypersonic reaction chamber, known as a hypersonic high-enthalpy reaction, or HyperREACT, facility. The facility contains a chamber with a 30-degree angle ramp near the propellent mixing chamber that stabilizes the oblique detonation wave.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is the first time a detonation has been shown to be stabilized experimentally,\u201d Ahmed says. \u201cWe are finally able to hold the detonation in space in\u00a0oblique detonation form. It\u2019s almost like freezing an intense explosion in physical space.\u201d<\/p>\n Gabriel Goodwin, an aerospace engineer with the Naval Research Laboratory\u2019s Naval Center for Space Technology and study co-author, says their research is helping to answer many of the fundamental questions that surround oblique detonation wave engines.<\/p>\n Goodwin\u2019s role in the study was to use the Naval Research Laboratory\u2019s computational fluid dynamics codes to simulate the experiments performed by Ahmed\u2019s group.<\/p>\n \u201cStudies such as this one are crucial to advancing our understanding of these complex phenomena and bringing us closer to developing engineering-scale systems,\u201d Goodwin says.<\/p>\n \u201cThis work is exciting and pushing the boundaries of both simulation<\/a> and experiment,\u201d Goodwin says. \u201cI\u2019m honored to be a part of it.\u201d<\/p>\n The study\u2019s lead author is Daniel Rosato \u201919 \u201920MS<\/strong>, a graduate research assistant and a recipient 色花堂\u2019s Presidential Doctoral Fellowship.<\/p>\n Rosato has been working on the project since he was an aerospace engineering undergraduate <\/a>student and is responsible for experiment design, fabrication, and operation, as well as data analysis, with assistance from Mason Thornton, a study co-author and an undergraduate research assistant.<\/p>\n Rosato says the next steps for the research are the addition of new diagnostics and measurement tools to gain a deeper understanding of the phenomena they are studying.<\/p>\n \u201cAfter that, we will continue exploring more experimental configurations to determine in more detail the criteria with which an oblique detonation wave can be stabilized,\u201d Rosato says.<\/p>\n