Event Details

Hydrodynamics and Fluid-Structure Interactions in Swimming Propulsion

Presenter: Mr. Goncalo Pedro - Department of Mechanical Engineering
Supervisor:

Date: Wed, August 22, 2001
Time: 14:00:00 - 15:00:00
Place: EOW 230

ABSTRACT

ABSTRACT

In aerodynamics and hydrodynamics, bird flight and fish swimming have inspired and guided the development of aircraft and underwater vehicles. It is interesting, however, to note how primitive these man-made machines seem compared to their natural counterparts in terms of intelligence, efficiency, agility, adaptiveness and functional complexity. These and other similar observations and issues have been addressed by the scientific community, have triggered the formulation of the science of biomimetics and have inspired new approaches to old problems.

The propulsion mechanism employed by animals and micro-organs living in the water, e.g., fish, water snakes, flagella and amoebae, are distinctly different from the propulsion systems found in today's undersea vehicles. Modern vessels used on or under the surface use propellers for propulsion and rudders to control the direction of travel. Such kinds of propulsion systems generate a significant amount of noise and may be unfriendly to marine ecology and environment, whereas marine animals and micro-organs usually self-propel in the water through continuous change of the shape of their bodies.

Problems in the self-propulsion of deformable bodies through fluids invite the cooperation of tools from structural mechanics, theoretical and experimental hydrodynamics, computational fluid dynamics and control theory, to name a few. The research is innovative, technologically feasible and industrially motivated in the field of undersea vehicle propulsion systems.

In the present research, Computational Fluid Dynamics was used to study a pitching and heaving hydrofoil with the goal of better understanding the hydrodynamics of swimming propulsion.

FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

Coffee and Cookies Will be Provided

For Further Information Please Contact: Goncalo Pedro (472-4212)