Gradient-based optimization of turbomachinery to reach climate neutrality
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To reach climate neutrality in aviation, electric propulsion is one of the many different alternatives currently looked into. A recurrent approach in electric propulsion for short haul commercial flight is to apply distributed propulsion along the wing span using small electric driven jets. These electric jet engines use a fan to accelerate the fluid and generate the thrust. The efficiency of the fan is in direct relation to the range of the aircraft for a given installed battery capacity and is therefore crucial for a successful introduction of electrically propelled flight. This lecture looks into a multidisciplinary optimization framework for turbomachinery that enables the design of highly performant fans. A Reynolds Averaged Navier Stokes solver is integrated with a Computational Structural Mechanics solver to strike a balance between aerodynamic efficiency and structural integrity. Adjoint solvers for both domains have been derived to provide gradient information to an Sequential Quadratic Programming optimizer. The developed optimization strategy is applied to the well-known NASA rotor 37 test case as a prototype for later use in electric propulsion systems.
