Details of Grant 

EPSRC Reference:	GR/S40824/01
Title:	Experimental Investigation of Autoignition Phenomena in Turbulent Flows
Principal Investigator:	Mastorakos, Professor E
Other Investigators:	Hochgreb, Professor S
Researcher Co-Investigators:
Project Partners:
Department:	Engineering
Organisation:	University of Cambridge
Scheme:	Standard Research (Pre-FEC)
Starts:	01 February 2004	Ends:	31 July 2007	Value (£):	179,071
EPSRC Research Topic Classifications:	Combustion
EPSRC Industrial Sector Classifications:	Aerospace, Defence and Marine Transport Systems and Vehicles
Related Grants:
Panel History:
Summary on Grant Application Form
The aim of this work is to examine experimentally the effects of turbulence on the autoignition of realistic fuels in initially non-premixed flows in a specially designed turbulent flow reactor. Such flows occur in lean, premixed, prevaporized (LPP) gas turbines and in compression-ignition engines, especially in the novel Homogeneous Charge Compression Ignition (HCCI) engines currently under development worldwide. Knowledge of the ignition delay time in the presence of mixture inhomogeneities, walls, and Intense turbulence would facilitate the development of all these lowemission, energy-efficient devices. The proposed research consists of two parts. In the first, various gaseous and liquid fuels including natural gas and kerosene will be injected In a direction parallel to a uniform turbulent flow of heated air at high pressures. The subsequent autoignition location will be used to define an ignition delay time that will be a function of the fuel type, temperature, pressure, turbulence and mixing pattern. This set of data will be of immediate use by the gas turbine industry when designing premixers. In the second part, laser-based point and planar diagnostics will be deployed to probe the structure of the reaction zones before ignition and species measurements with gas chromatography will be undertaken. This set of data will assist in validating chemical and CFD models and general turbulent reacting flow closures for low Damkohler number situations, which is of both practical and fundamental importance. The proposed set-up Is novel, but a preliminary low-pressure rig has already proven that the experiment proposed here is feasible and rich in phenomena.
Key Findings
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Organisation Website:	http://www.cam.ac.uk