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Faculty
Member Name: Adrian Gerlich

Department: Chemical and Materials Engineering

University: University of Alberta

Language of supervision for the research project: English

Title : Friction stir processing of nanostructured metal matrix composite

Dr. Chao Zhang

Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, University of Western Ontario

Faculty web site: http://www.eng.uwo.ca/people/czhang/

Project description, click here

Other Project Facts

Are other faculty members involved?

No

Will the student be part of a research team with other students?

Yes ----  **** Doctoral students

Is the research project applied in nature?

Yes

If the project is applied, is there an industrial partner connected to the research project?

No

Will the student have the opportunity to interact with the industrial partner?

No

Nitrogen Oxides (NOx) and soot are the major air pollutants produced by diesel engines. On

most newly designed diesel engines, engine controllers are equipped to regulate engine

operating conditions and combustion processes in order to reduce the exhaust emissions. The

NOx and soot control models, which describes the correlations between the engine operating

conditions and the pipe-out pollutants amount, are the essential part of the engine control. The

emissions control models are traditionally developed through a large amount of engine testing

work. In this study, linear NOx and soot control models are constructed through numerical

engine simulations.

The combustion process inside of a diesel engine is extremely complex. It contains turbulent

two-phase flow, mass and heat transfer, diesel fuel oxidation, and pollutant formations. The
three-dimensional numerical models used in this study will be based on the engine combustion

models used in KIVA-3V code which was developed by Los Alamos National Laboratory. The

numerical model will be calibrated by the in-cylinder pressure data from a Yanmar L70v diesel

engine in our lab.MITACS Globalink– Faculty Project Overview 2

The KIVA-3V code is then used to calculate the NOx and soot formations in a direct injection

diesel engine under different operating conditions, such as load, RPM and EGR rate. The heat

release curve of each condition can be generated by analyzing the in-cylinder pressure data. The

following correlations between the pollutant formations and the heat release rate need to be

established: 1) the correlation between NOx and soot formations and the peak value of the heat

release rate in one engine cycle; 2) the correlations between NOx and soot formations and the

timing of the heat release peak; 3) the correlation between soot formations and the total heat

release amount in one engine cycle. Based on those correlations, linear control models for NOx

and soot emissions will be constructed. Since the linear control models require minimum

computation time, they are idea for a hi-speed engine control system which is proposed in this

study. In such a system, the real-time in-cylinder pressure is measured at each crank-angle

during the engine operations and the instantaneous heat release rate is calculated and used to

control the emissions reduction devices, such as an exhaust gas recirculation valve, to reduce

the NOx and soot emissions. The emissions control models developed through the numerical

simulations will be implemented into the controller of a single-cylinder diesel engine and

tested.

Continue as required to 2 page maximum

Role for Student: (provide a brief description of no more than 1 page the specific role that you

have for the Globalink student on the research project)

The Globalink student will work with a Ph.D. student. He/She will learn how to run the

KIVA code and do simulations using KIVA code for the engine under different

operating conditions. The Globalink student will also participate the experimental

work.M

Student Background / Skills Requirements: (specify

research interest requirements,
knowledge background required, prior course
prerequisites if any, software or hardware
knowledge if any, other specialized skill sets needed)
The student should have taken Thermodynamics,
Fluid Mechanics and Heat Transfer courses
already