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This study aims to investigate the physical mechanisms of the use of active flow control (AFC) for a high-lift wing-flap configuration.

By means of high-fidelity numerical simulations, the flow dynamics around a high-lift wing-flap system at high Reynolds number (Re/c = 4.6 million) is studied. Adapted turbulence models based on the URANS approach are used to capture the flow separation and the subsequent development of coherent structures. The present study focuses on the use of AFC using a synthetic jet known as zero-net-mass-flux (ZNMF) using the blowing–suction approach. Different parameters (geometry, frequency and velocity) of a ZNMF placed at the cambered flap’s chord are optimized to obtain the most efficient parameter settings to suppress the flow separation.

A synthetic jet with the optimal shape and orientation enforces the flow reattachment on the wing-flap surface. This leads to an improvement of the aerodynamic performance of the system. The wake thickness was reduced by 30%, and an increase of 17.6% in lift-to-drag ratio was obtained. Concerning the ZNMF location, they should be installed upstream of the separation point to achieve the best performance.

The effectiveness of ZNMF devices integrated on a high-lift wing-flap configuration was studied in real flight conditions at high Reynolds number. A detailed analysis of the wake dynamics explains how AFC forces the reattachment of the boundary layer and attenuates the predominant wake instabilities up to −20 dB.

The area behind the engine/wing junction of conventional civil aircraft configurations with underwing-mounted turbofans is susceptible to local flow separation at high angles of attack, which potentially impacts maximum lift performance of the aircraft. This paper aims to present the design, testing and optimization of two distinct systems of fluidic actuation dedicated to reduce separation at the engine/wing junction.

Active flow control applied at the unprotected leading edge inboard of the engine pylon has shown considerable potential to alleviate or even eliminate local flow separation, and consequently regain maximum lift performance. Two actuator systems, pulsed jet actuators with and without net mass flux, are tested and optimized with respect to an upcoming large-scale wind tunnel test to assess the effect of active flow control on the flow behavior. The requirements and parameters of the flow control hardware are set by numerical simulations of project partners.

The results of ground test show that full modulation of the jets of the non-zero mass flux actuator is achieved. In addition, it could be shown that the required parameters can be satisfied at design mass flow, and that pressure levels are within bounds. Furthermore, a new generation of zero-net mass flux actuators with improved performance is presented and described. This flow control system includes the actuator devices, their integration, as well as the drive and control electronics system that is used to drive groups of actuators.

The originality is given by the application of the two flow control systems in a scheduled large-scale wind tunnel test.

The aims of this study were to investigate the effect of using a wall‐normal, 2D micro zero‐net‐mass‐flux (ZNMF) jet located at the leading edge of a NACA 0015 airfoil to actively control flow separation and enhance lift.

Experiments were conducted over a two‐dimensional airfoil in a water tunnel at a Reynolds number of 3.08 × 10⁴ for the parametric investigation and the detailed multigrid cross‐correlation digital particle image velocimetry (MCCDPIV) measurements. Flow visualisation experiments were carried out at a lower Reynolds number of 1.54 × 10⁴.

The largest lift increase was observed when a non‐dimensional frequency of 1.3 and an oscillatory momentum blowing coefficient of 0.14 per cent was employed. Under these forcing conditions the stall angle of the airfoil was mitigated from an angle of attack of 10^o to one of 18^o, resulting in a maximum lift coefficient increase of 46 per cent above the uncontrolled lift coefficient. Planar laser induced fluoroscopy and MCCDPIV revealed that the lift increments were the result of the generation of a train of large‐scale, spanwise lifting vortices that convected over the suction surface of the airfoil. The presence of these structures resulted in the flow seemingly remaining attached to the upper surface of the airfoil for a wider range of angles of attack.

This study is significant as it provides quantitative experimental data, which clearly demonstrates the effectiveness of a 2D micro ZNMF jet in controlling flow separation of a NACA 0015 airfoil at high angles of attack and thus, enhancing lift. Furthermore, the flow visualisations and MCCDPIV measurements have provided insight into the mechanisms responsible for the improvement in lift. This new understanding has applications beyond the NACA 0015 airfoil used in this study.

The cylindrical wake flow is an important part of many engineering applications, including wake turbulence, acoustic noise, and lift/drag forces on bodies. The suppression of von Kármán vortex street (VKS) is an important goal for flow control devices. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

The linear plasma synthetic jet actuator (L-PSJA) is utilized as a flow control device to suppress the VKS formation. Different configurations of the device is studied numerically.

Of the 12 configurations that were investigated, five configurations were able to suppress the formation of the VKS.

For the first time, the L-PSJA has been shown (through numerical simulations) to be able to suppress VKS.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze and optimize synthetic jet actuators (SJAs) by means of a literature-known one-dimensional analytical model.

The model was fit to a wide range of experimental data from in-house built SJAs with different dimensions. A comprehensive parameter study was performed to identify coupling between parameters of the model and to find optimal dimensions of SJAs.

The coupling of two important parameters, the diaphragm resonance frequency and the cavity volume, can be described by a power law. Optimal orifice length and diameter can be calculated from cavity height in good agreement with literature. A transient oscillation correction is required to get correct simulation outcomes.

Based on these findings, SJA devices can be optimized for maximum jet velocity and, therefore, high performance.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the synthetic jet actuator design's performance based on piezoelectric diaphragms that can be appropriately used for flow separation control.

Design the synthetic jet actuators by means of estimating the several parameters and non‐dimensional parameters. Understanding the relationship and coupling effects of these parameters on the actuator to produce exit air jet required. Experiments were conducted to measure the exit air jet velocity using a hot‐wire anemometry and determine the good operational frequencies and voltages of the actuators for different cavity volume.

The performance of synthetic jet actuator is not consistent to a particular given frequency and it depends on design configurations. Each actuator will give a very good speed for a certain frequency. The results show that the exit air jet velocity increases would be better if the cavity volume is reduced and if the input voltage is increased to certain limits.

The limit of input voltage for the actuators that can be achieved for good jet speed is 2V of about 205V output voltage for each frequency. The jet speed obtained is sufficient enough to control the separation for an aircraft which has a small wing chord and low speed. Therefore, more studies are needed to optimize the sizes of an orifice and cavity, and the selection of piezoelectric diaphragm.

The study helps in establishing a flow control device for controlling flow separation, especially on airfoils.

Design the synthetic jet actuators based on piezoelectric diaphragm for applications of flow separation control.

In the European project AFLoNext, active flow control (AFC) measures were adopted in the wing tip extension leading edge to suppress flow separation. It is expected that the designed wing tip extension may improve aerodynamic efficiency by about 2 per cent in terms of fuel consumption and emissions. As the leading edge of the wing tip is not protected with high-lift device, flow separation occurs earlier than over the inboard wing in the take-off/landing configuration. The aim of this study is the adoption of AFC to delay wing tip stall and to improve lift-to-drag ratio.

Several actuator locations and AFC strategies were tested with computational fluid dynamics. The first approach was “standard” one with physical modeling of the actuators, and the second one was focused on the volume forcing method. The actuators location and the forcing plane close to separation line of the reference configuration were chose to enhance the flow with steady and pulsed jet blowing. Dependence of the lift-to-drag benefit with respect to injected mass flow is investigated.

The mechanism of flow separation onset is identified as the interaction of slat-end and wing tip vortices. These vortices moving toward each other with increasing angle of attack (AoA) interact and cause the flow separation. AFC is applied to control the slat-end vortex and the inboard movement of the wing tip vortex to suppress their interaction. The separation onset has been postponed by about 2° of AoA; the value of ift-to-drag (L/D) was improved up to 22 per cent for the most beneficial cases.

The AFC using the steady or pulsed blowing (PB) was proved to be an effective tool for delaying the flow separation. Although better values of L/D have been reached using steady blowing, it is also shown that PB case with a duty cycle of 0.5 needs only one half of the mass flow.

Two approaches of different levels of complexity are studied and compared. The first is based on physical modeling of actuator cavities, while the second relies on volume forcing method which does not require detailed actuator modeling. Both approaches give consistent results.

The purpose of this paper is to describe the flow structure and the time-resolved and time-mean heat transfer characteristics in the interaction between a synthetic jet and a cross flow, when an obstruction reduces the cross-section of the orifice where the jet is formed.

The microchannel flow interacted by the pulsed jet is modeled using a two-dimensional finite volume simulation with unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes equations while using the Shear-Stress-Transport (SST) k-ω turbulence model to account for fluid turbulence.

The computational results show a good and rapid increase of the synthetic jet influence on heat transfer enhancement when the obstruction of the orifice is superior to 30 per cent and the synthetic jet oscillating amplitudes are below 50 µm. It is found that when the obstruction is close to the exit orifice, the heat transfer enhancement is significant. The obstruction has proved to accelerate the jet and change the formation of large vortical structures. Additional windward vortices appear, which influence the flow field and enhance the heat transfer.

The work proposes the use of a compound enhancement technique for electronics cooling. A limited range of operating conditions and geometrical configurations is presented. A further analysis of the performance evaluation, based on the increased energy consumption of the device, would complement the study.

The authors provide a compound technique to enhance heat transfer in synthetic-jet electronic cooling devices.

This paper aims to investigate the effects of a dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) plasma actuator (PA) qualitatively on aerodynamic characteristics of a 3 D-printed NACA 4412 airfoil model.

Airflow visualization study was performed at a Reynolds number of 35,000 in a small-scale open-loop wind tunnel. The effect of plasma actuation on flow separation was compared for the DBD PA with four different electrode configurations at 10°, 20° and 30° angles of attack.

Plasma activation may delay the onset of flow separation up to 6° and decreases the boundary layer thickness. The effects of plasma diminish as the angle of attack increases. Streamwise electrode configuration, in which electric wind is produced in a direction perpendicular to the freestream, is more effective in the reattachment of the airflow compared to the spanwise electrode configuration, in which the electric wind and the free stream are in the same direction.

The Reynolds number is much smaller than that in cruise aircraft conditions; however, the results are promising for low-velocity subsonic airflows such as improving control capabilities of unmanned aerial vehicles.

Superior efficacy of spanwise-generated electric wind over streamwise-generated one is demonstrated at a very low Reynolds number. The results in the plasma aerodynamics literature can be reproduced using ultra-low-cost off-the-shelf components. This is important because high voltage power amplifiers that are frequently encountered in the literature may be prohibitively expensive especially for resource-limited university aerodynamics laboratories.

The development of novel cooling techniques is needed in order to be able to substantially increase the performance of integrated electronic circuits whose operations are limited by the maximum allowable temperature. Air cooled micro‐channels etched in the silicon substrate have the potential to remove heat directly from the chip. For reasonable pressure drops, the flow in micro‐channels is inherently laminar, so that the heat transfer is not very large. A synthetic jet may be used to improve mixing, thereby considerably increasing heat transfer. This paper seeks to address this issue.

CFD has been used to study the flow and thermal fields in forced convection in a two‐dimensional micro‐channel with an inbuilt synthetic jet actuator. The unsteady Navier‐Stokes and energy equations are solved. The effects of variation of the frequency of the jet at a fixed pressure difference between the ends of the channel and with a fixed jet Reynolds number, have been studied with air as the working fluid. Although the velocities are very low, the compressibility of air has to be taken into account.

The use of a synthetic jet appreciably increases the rate of heat transfer. However, in the frequency range studied, whilst there are significant changes in the details of the flow, due primarily to large phase changes with frequency, there is little effect of the frequency on the overall rate heat transfer. The rates of heat transfer are not sufficiently large for air to be a useful cooling medium for the anticipated very large heat transfer rates in future generations of microchips.

The study is limited to two‐dimensional flows so that the effect of other walls is not considered.

It does not seem likely that air flowing in channels etched in the substrate of integrated circuits can be successfully used to cool future, much more powerful microchips, despite a significant increase in the heat transfer caused by synthetic jet actuators.

CFD is used to determine the thermal performance of air flowing in micro‐channels with and without synthetic jet actuators as a means of cooling microchips. It has been demonstrated that synthetic jets significantly increase the rate of heat transfer in the micro‐channel, but that changing the frequency with the same resulting jet Reynolds number does not have an effect on the overall rate of heat transfer. The significant effect of compressibility on the phase shifts and more importantly on the apparently anomalous heat transfer from the “cold” air to the “hot” wall is also demonstrated.