Global Collaborative Research and Education Center for Integrated Flow Science (IFS-GCORE)

Energy Dynamics Laboratory

  • ProfessorKaoru Maruta

  • Associate ProfessorHisashi Nakamura

  • Assistant ProfessorYouhi Morii

We pursue research and development on effective energy conversion and energy process in combustion and reactive thermal f1uid systems with new technology concepts. By basing heat and/or mass regenerations for low-exergy-loss combustion as keywords, interdisciplinary researches are conducted with domestic and international collaboration partners in academic and industry.
·Micro-, Mild and Microgravity combustions
·Multi-stage oxidation by micro f1ow reactor with prescribed temperature profile
·Combustion with surrogate fuels, biomass, synthetic fuels, and ammonia
·Super lean burn and knock suppression for automotive gasoline engines
·High-temperature oxy-fuel combustion

Study on Ignition and Low-Temperature Oxidation by Micro Reactor

Stationary multi-stage oxidations of alternative fuels, and biofuels, and ammonia were realized by a micro flow reactor with a controlled temperature profile. Effects of reactivity indexes such as octane number and cetane number, composition of fuels and pressure on the multi-stage oxidation can be observed. A high fidelity reaction design is being developed with solid theoretical basis. This methodology was commercialized as a measurement instrument.
  • Stationary multi-stage oxidation observed by micro tlow reactor with cont「oiled temperature profile and octane number dependence of the stationary multi-stage oxidation

Swissroll Microcombustors for Heat Sources

We have developed Swissroll microcombustor heaters with土 1 ゜C temperature controllability whereas it is combustion-based. Since gaseous hydrocarbon fuels are directly introduced into combustors, total thermal efficiencies of the heaters are twice or even larger compared with those of conventional electric heaters.Besides this, the microcombustor heaters can be operated in any atmospheres because it is sealed. They are advantageous of electromagnetic induction free as well. We have also succeeded in developing coin-size combustor. A furnace for food industry employing the principle of our microcombustor is under development with IHI.
  • Swissroll microcombustor in operation (Diameter: 64 mm)
  • Coin size combustor (Diameter: 20 mm)

Super Lean Burn and Knock Suppression for Automotive Gasoline Engines

Super lean burn is attracting attention to achieve more than 50% thermal efficiency in automotive gasoline engines. It is essential to introduce highly turbulence into the engine in super lean burn conditions. However, a transition from ignition to flame propagation is significantly difficult under intense turbulence. For understanding of the fundamental combustion characteristics of the ignition difficulty under the intense turbulence, the observation of ignition phenomena under highly turbulent conditions have been conducted using a special combustion vessel with counter-rotating fans. Numerical analysis of engine knock is also conducted to establish the way to suppress the knock by examining the conditions under which the knock occurs.
  • Schlieren images of ignition kernels in laminar and turbulent conditions.
  • Density gradient before and after knock onset by direct numerical simulation.

Ultra low-Stretched Counterflow Flames under Microgravity Environment in”Kibo”Japanese Experimental Module and Airplane

扱う理論構築・検証を目標としています。 Our proposal on space combustion experiment was selected as a project at the “Kibo” Japanese Experimental Module in the International Space Station. The objective is to construct the unified combustion limit theory of propagating fiame and fiame ball under the oxygen combustion condition using ultra low-stretched counterfiow fiames.
  • Counterflow flames under microgravity environment and International Space Station & ai「C「aft for microgravity experiment