MAE 402—Unsteady Separated Flows: Theory and Practice

This course covers theory and methods for analyzing unsteady separated flows, applicable to aerodynamics of drones in maneuvers and gusts, bio-inspired propulsion and biofluids, etc. Topics include vorticity and vortex dynamics, flow separation and bluff-body flows, added-mass force, calculating forces from flow fields, and basic low-order modeling and scaling. Throughout the course, experimental methods used to investigate these topics will be introduced: measuring unsteady forces, particle image velocimetry (PIV), and dye visualization. Students will learn to post-process and interpret actual experimental data, understand the limitations, and therefore gain practice and physical insight on the concepts; lab tours will also be given.