FLOCON

"Flow Control: Reduced Order Modelling, Nonlinear Analysis and Control Design"

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 Obiettivo del progetto (Objective)

'Fluid flow, i.e. the motion of liquids or gases, is a phenomenon that one encounters continuously in everyday life. The flow of air around the body of a car or the wing of an aircraft, the motion of petroleum through pipelines, flow of water in oceans and the motion of the clouds are only a few examples of fluid flows. Flow control refers to the ability to manipulate fluid flow to achieve a desired change in its behaviour. Flow control is very important from a technological point of view and offers many potential benefits, such as reducing fuel costs for land, air and sea vehicles, and improving effectiveness of industrial processes. Although this potential impact had been understood for a long time, the interest and funding on the topic had been modest, due to technological and economical difficulties regarding its implementation. The situation turned around dramatically with the recent advances on sensors, actuation and computing, as a result of which flow control today is more practical and economical than ever. EU’s strong interest to explore this direction is also indicated by its relevance to a high number of objectives within the FP7 Cooperation Programme, under the Transport (including Aeronautics) theme, Energy, Space and Security Themes. The project proposed aims at improving the state of the art in flow control through two main directions identified through the researcher’s past experience and research efforts in the field, namely: reduced order models amenable to control design and, nonlinear analysis and control design techniques. The research in the proposed project will investigate these directions through developing original and innovative methods that stem from the researcher’s earlier promising results. These methods have the potential of bringing a whole new perspective to the way we approach and attack flow control problems, advance the current state of the art, and eventually become an integral part of numerous technologies in diverse areas.'

Introduzione (Teaser)

The ability to control the flow of fluids or gases is important to a plethora of disciplines. Novel models and flow control design tools promise to facilitate reduced turbulence in numerous systems with a variety of benefits.

Descrizione progetto (Article)

Air flowing over a plane's wing, petroleum flowing in long-distance pipes and the movement of blood in arteries are all governed by the physics behind fluid flow. Recent technological advances in the sensors and software realms have made the exploitation of fluid control systems more advantageous and economically feasible. However, the numerical methods typically applied are highly complicated and non-linear.

Simplified approximations are necessary to make the analysis and design of fluid control systems accessible to the majority of researchers. Such was the impetus behind the EU-funded project 'Flow control: Reduced order modelling, nonlinear analysis and control design' (FLOCON).

Scientists first sought to create simplified (reduced order) models to form the foundations for analysis and design of flow control systems. The focus was on linear models that are more easily employed but with an eye on expansion to simple non-linear ones as well.

Instantaneous velocities at certain time intervals (snapshots) were either collected experimentally via particle image velocimetry or generated theoretically via computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations. The team exploited established techniques to produce reduced order models from the data. The models were shown to accurately represent observed flow dynamics.

During the second half, the team applied the modelling methodology to the design of a flow control system. The test case was enabling control of the local spinning or rotation of a fluid (vorticity) behind an immersed circular cylinder system. Following an experimental campaign to collect input points over the cylinder and within, researchers estimated a non-linear dynamic model and designed a controller. They tested it numerically in MATLAB and with CFD simulations demonstrating a significant reduction in vorticity with the controller.

Control of flow is important to reducing non-linearities and turbulence in many industrial and commercial applications. FLOCON has delivered important tools to help designers develop control systems that work with potential impact on the EU space, transport, energy and security sectors.