International Journal of Thermal Sciences 121 (2017) 228e236

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International Journal of Thermal Sciences

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijts

Flame imaging reconstruction method using high resolution spectral

data of OH*, CH* and C2* radicals
Dario Alviso a, b, *, Miguel Mendieta a, Jorge Molina a, Juan Carlos Rolo
n a
a
Laboratorio de Mecanica y Energía, Facultad de Ingeniería, Universidad Nacional de Asuncio
n, Campus Universitario, San Lorenzo 2160, Paraguay
b mica, Facultad de Ingeniería, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Paseo Colo
Laboratorio de Fluidodina n 850 CABA, Argentina

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This paper focuses on a technique to obtain images of the spatial distribution of ultraviolet OH*, visible
Received 5 August 2016 CH* and C2 * species present in hydrocarbon flames. This is achieved by combining sequentially acquired
Received in revised form chemiluminescence spectra along slices defined by the entrance slit of an imaging spectrometer for
13 July 2017
narrow wavelength bands corresponding to the species of interest. As the analysis has been performed in
Accepted 19 July 2017
an axisymmetric conical flame, the Abel inversion procedure has been applied to reduce the effect caused
by the line of sight. The images resulting from the proposed reconstruction procedure are compared with
the images collected with simple chemiluminescence visualization (detected with an ICCD camera) and
Keywords:
Emission spectroscopy
respective narrow-band interference filters. Although the technique has been applied only in laminar
Flame imaging steady flame condition, it could be interesting for application in more advanced, laser-sheet based di-
Flame reconstruction agnostics. The main advantages of the proposed technique are the high spectral resolution of the
Laminar stationary flames resulting radical images and the possibility of detecting other species (in the ultraviolet, visible or
infrared regions) by combining chemiluminescence spectra at different wavelengths.
© 2017 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction equivalence ratio and heat release rate fluctuations [1e4]. In

Chemiluminescence is the emission of light by molecules
returning to the fundamental state following different pathways,
creating a spectrum with characteristic bands for each radical.
Regarding the characteristic flame structure, the primary combus-
tion zone of hydrocarbon flames is distinct from the other parts of
the flame by its emission of mostly visible bands, namely CH* bands
at 431 nm ðA2 D/X 2 PÞ and C2 * bands at 516 nm ðd3 Pg /a3 Pu Þ
(Swan band). The ultraviolet OH* bands at 306.4 nm ðA2 S þ /X 2 PÞ
are observed mainly in the emission from the outer zone of the
flame in which the secondary combustion takes place.
A convenient way to experimentally study the flame behaviour
is to analyze the space and time resolved emission of excited spe-
cies CH*, C2 * and OH*, which are not at equilibrium under flame
conditions. Indeed, these radicals are naturally present in the high
temperature reaction zone and permit to determine important
macroscopic properties such as flame location, flame speed,
* Corresponding author. Laboratorio de Mec anica y Energía, Facultad de Ingen-
iería, Universidad Nacional de Asuncio n, Campus Universitario, San Lorenzo 2160,
Paraguay.
E-mail address: beto.alviso@gmail.com (D. Alviso).
laminar methane-air premixed flames, chemiluminescene of these
three radicals have been studied extensively [2,5e9].
In the past few years, a quick development of image processing
theory was observed [10e12]. Imaging spectroscopy - also know as
hyperspectral imaging-is a new imaging technique that has been a
research field in image processing that has grown recently [13,14].
In combustion, a digital image-based flame emission spectrometric
method for quantitative chemical analysis has been carried out by
Lyra et al. [15]. Moreover, digital colour image processing of
measured premixed CH4 þ air and C2 H4 þ air flame chem-
iluminescence of CH* and C2 * was done by Huang and Zhang [16].
Several flames reconstruction were recently developed, espe-
cially concerning 3D temperature. For instance, an experimental
study on simultaneously reconstruction of three-dimensional
temperature and inhomogeneous radiative properties distribution
by radiation image processing was performed recently by Xiangyu
et al. [17].
In addition, a novel solution to accurately reconstruct three-
dimensional temperature field for combustion flame was pre-
sented by Wang et al. [18].
Also, a novel geometric calibration method for focused light
field camera to trace the rays of flame radiance and the

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijthermalsci.2017.07.019
1290-0729/© 2017 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.
 D. Alviso et al. / International Journal of Thermal Sciences 121 (2017) 228e236
reconstruction of the three-dimensional (3-D) temperature distri-
bution of a flame was proposed by Sun et al. [19].
Furthermore, a novel optical sectioning tomography for the
measurement of three-dimensional temperature of flame through
a single camera in combination with an ionic electrowetting-based
variable focus liquid lens was proposed by Xu et al. [20].
Moreover, a system for accurate tomographic reconstruction of
the combustion temperature and H2 O vapor concentration of a
flame based on laser absorption measurements, in combination
with an innovative two-step algebraic reconstruction technique,
was recently developed by Xia et al. [21].
Finally, a multispectral imaging system is proposed by Ni et al.
[22] for the 3-D reconstruction of soot temperature and volume
fraction distributions.
Many studies were developed concerning the issue of tomo-
graphic reconstruction techniques. For example, a tomographic
reconstruction of excited-state CH radicals in methane-air and
propane-air flames was performed by Hertz and Faris [23].
Also, an axisymmetric laminar diffusion flame was studied using
optical measurements by Luque et al. [24]. Integral emission of
excited CH and OH radicals was measured. Emission intensity
measurements were line-of-sight-integrated and the two-
dimensional, in-plane intensity distribution was recovered with
an Abel inversion.
In addition, 3-D reconstruction of instantaneous distribution of
chemiluminescence of a turbulent propane-air rich premixed flame
was performed by Ishino and Ohiwa [25], where a slice-by-slice
reconstruction technique was applied and a multi-lens camera
equipped with forty small lenses provided forty views for recording
data at each slice.
Moreover, the emission tomography method was applied to
relate the hydroxyl OH radicals chemiluminescent emission from a
combustion flame to spatial heat release by Timmerman and
Bryanston-cross [26]. In this work it has been shown that the OH
radical emission is directly proportional to heat release in premixed
flames.
Furthermore, the design, implementation and evaluation of a 3-
D imaging system for the reconstruction of the luminosity distri-
bution of a combustion flame have been presented by Gilabert et al.
[27], where the acquisition system comprised three identical sets of
red-green-blue CCD cameras and is capable of capturing flame
images from six equiangular directions.
More recently, a reliable reconstruction technique applicable to
axisymmetric and non-axisymmetric flames was presented by
Denisova et al. [28], where a computing algorithm based on the
maximum entropy (MENT) concept in combination with data
preprocessing procedure has been developed. This approach was
used for the reconstruction of OH, CH and C2 radical chem-
iluminescences in the axisymmetric propane-air flame of a Bunsen-
type burner.
As mentioned, in the past most reported research works were
concentrated on reconstruction of temperature or tomographic
techniques, whereas the reconstruction of excited species using
chemiluminescence spectra was less common.
The goal of this paper is to propose a reliable reconstruction
method that can be applied for qualitative diagnostics of chem-
iluminescence intensities of CH*, C2 * and OH* radicals. First, a
methane-air conical flame was produced in a nozzle type burner. A
‘spectral scan’ was done using the burner's position control system
in the horizontal direction with a high spatial resolution. Then,
chemiluminescence spectra of species of interest were acquired at
each point, defined by the entrance slit of the imaging spectrom-
eter. Finally, flame reconstruction was achieved by combining
sequentially narrow wavelength bands (high spectral resolution)
around each species bandheads, corresponding to their horizontal
229
positions. Although the technique has been applied only in laminar
steady flame condition, it can be used in more advanced laser-sheet
based diagnostics.
In this work we focus on the reconstruction method and the
validation of the obtained results, without discussing in detail the
flame structure of the reconstructed images. Therefore, no novel
information related to conical laminar flows are deduced from the
experimental results. The main advantages of the proposed tech-
nique are: i) the higher spectral resolution of the resulting radical
images, in comparison to direct visualization images; ii) the fact
that other spectral lines at different wavelengths could have been
chosen for each radical, and thus making the spectral reconstruc-
tion of the same radicals, but for other wavelengths; iii) the pos-
sibility of detecting other species not easily accessible using direct
visualization, by combining chemiluminescence spectra at different
wavelengths in the ultraviolet, visible or infrared regions,
depending on the spectrometer spectral range; and iv) flame
emission intensities in reconstructed images are much stronger
(better signal to noise ratio) than those obtained with direct visu-
alization (the same ICCD camera was used and time exposure of
visualization was 3 times bigger than that of the reconstructed
technique). This effect might be due to the fact that visualization of
excited radicals is performed experimentally by filtering the signal
captured by the camera through interference filters with trans-
mission coefficients much lower than 100%, and making an inte-
gration over the filter bandwidth.
The paper is organized as follows. In Section 2, the experimental
facility and chemiluminescence emission measurements are pre-
sented. In Section 3, the experimental reconstruction procedure
developed in this work is presented. Then, in Section 4, the vali-
dation of reconstructed images is done in 3 stages:i) by comparing
reconstructed flames and direct visualization images for studied
species; ii) by comparing laminar flame speeds estimated for
reconstructed and visualization images to those obtained numeri-
cally using a well-known methane chemical mechanism; iii) and by
comparing radial profiles of studied species using also both optical
diagnostic techniques. Finally, the conclusions are presented in
Section 5.
2. Experimental setup
2.1. Burner device
The experiments were carried out on a nozzle type burner,
which consists of an axisymmetric convergent injection nozzle of
Fig. 1. A) Positioning and burner systems, B) Emission Spectroscopy Setup and C)
Visualization Setup.
230 D. Alviso et al. / International Journal of Thermal Sciences 121 (2017) 228e236

20 mm inner diameter, where a premixed gaseous flow of methane C2 * and OH* radicals, respectively, with a bandwidth corresponding
and air is injected (Fig. 1A). The injection nozzle has been designed to the FWHM (full width at half maximum) of each bandhead,
to have a uniform velocity profile at the nozzle exit, and is sur- which were less than 1 nm for each radical.
rounded by a coaxial nozzle fed by nitrogen to prevent the devel- The spectral images were taken for several points along the
opment of a reaction zone between the reactants and the ambient conical flame in the horizontal direction for each studied radical,
air, and also to ensure the desired initial conditions. The nozzle with a spatial resolution of 50 mm. And for each point, 10 images
contains two layers of honeycomb to reduce turbulent structures in were taken. Therefore, for each radical, an average over 10 spectral
the plenum chamber of the nozzle. images were made. This point will be further explained in Section 3.
Experiments were performed for premixed methane-air flames The uncertainty of the measurement for each radical was estimated
with different initial conditions of equivalence ratio f ¼ 0:9  1:2 from the 10 images, in comparison to the average values. It was
with steps of 0.1. Flow velocity at the nozzle edge was 0:9 ms1 , and estimated to 10%.
outlet temperature of the mixture was 300 K.
All gaseous mass flows were controlled by flow meters based on
2.4. Visualization
the principle of a sonic nozzle, with an accuracy of 1.0% and a
repeatability of 0.5% of the full scale.
Images of CH* and C2 * emission have been recorded using the
ICCD camera presented in the previous section. In this case, the
2.2. Burner's position control system
camera was equipped with a lens of 105 mm focal length (visible
range of wavelength). Narrow-band interference filters were
The ‘spectral scan’ of the flames requires a very precise posi-
interposed along the optical path for capturing the CH* and C2 *
tioning system (Fig. 1A). The burner's position, relative to the
emission (Fig. 1C). The filter used for CH* has 60% transmission and
spectrometer entrance slit is controlled by a semiautomatic control
a 10 nm bandwidth centered at 430 nm. The filter used for C2 * has
system. The system itself is based in a Micro-Controlle® positioner
75% transmission and a 30 nm bandwidth centered at 515 nm. The
mechanically connected to a step-by-step translation that allows a
exposure time was fixed, throughout the experiments, to 45 ms. An
full range of 25 mm with a 2:5 mm minimum step, ensuring the
average over 10 images was made. The uncertainty of the mea-
precision requirements for this study.
surement for each radical was estimated from the 10 images, in
comparison to the average values. It was estimated to 8%. Conical
2.3. Emission spectroscopy
flames are very stable, thus the exposure time could be increased
(in comparison to emission spectroscopy images obtained with
Emission spectroscopy is a 2-D non-intrusive diagnostic tech-
15 ms) without necessarily increasing the flame thickness. This has
nique that offers spatially resolved data for combustion optimiza-
been done for the visualization images in order to increase the
tion and control. The visible chemiluminescence of the excited
signal captured by the camera.
radicals CHðA2 D/X 2 PÞ denoted CH*, C2 ðd3 Pg /a3 Pu Þ denoted
Abel inversion was also used to reduce the effects of integration
C2 * and UV emission of OHðA2 S þ /X 2 PÞ denoted OH* were
in the line of sight.
measured by Optical Emission Spectroscopy (OES). The objective of
these measurements is to obtain wavelength resolved spectral
images of the conical flames corresponding at each excited radical, 3. Experimental reconstruction procedure
in order to reconstruct the flame structure by means of narrow
band spectral data processing obtained with an optical multi- The experimental reconstruction procedure will be explained in
channel analyzer (OMA). this Section for CH* radical. However, the procedure remains
A 300 mm (collimating) and a 100 mm (focusing) focal length similar for C2 * and OH* species, by taking narrow wavelength bands
lenses were used to focus the light emitted by the flame into the corresponding to the species of interest.
entrance slit of a Jobin Yvon HR-460 spectrometer, which has a Fig. 2 shows a typical OMA spectral image of CH* radical (for an
Czerny-Turner configuration (Fig. 1B). The diffraction grating used equivalence ratio of 1.1), where the abscissa corresponds to the
had 1200 gratings/mm and the focal length of the spherical colli- selected wavelength in nm, and the ordinate to the height in mm
mating and focusing mirrors was 460 mm. The emission spectrum (about 25 mm for each spectral image). The intensity captured by
was recorded by a 576  384 pixels Intensified CCD camera each pixel of the image corresponds to the CH* species chem-
(Princeton Instruments). It must be noted that the spectrometer iluminescence emission.
entrance slit is vertical, therefore the y-coordinate in the spectral
image, due to the optics configuration, corresponds to a height of
25 mm parallel to the axis of the conical flame.
For CH*, C2 * and OH*, an entrance slit width of 4 mm was chosen
(the height is fixed to 18 mm), giving a spectral resolution of
0.16 nm. The exposure time was kept constant to 15 ms.
We have made the hypothesis that the recorded signal by the
camera follows the line of sight (as in a homogeneous medium),
which creates an integrated signal along its trajectory. Therefore, as
the conical flame is axisymmetric, Abel inversion is used to reduce
the effects of the integration and get the trace of the flame front in
the symmetry plane of the flame, as done in Refs. [9,29].
The CH* population was obtained by making an acquisition
between 420 and 440 nm wavelength, while C2 * population was
acquired between 500 and 520 nm wavelength and OH* population
was acquired between 300 and 320 nm wavelength. However, only
the band head of each system was taken into account to reconstruct
the conical flame: the band heads at 431, 516 and 308 nm for CH*, Fig. 2. Spectral image of CH* radical - f ¼ 1:1.
 D. Alviso et al. / International Journal of Thermal Sciences 121 (2017) 228e236 231

Fig. 3 shows the conical flame's reconstruction procedure

scheme. First, an ‘spectral scan’ was done using the burner's posi-
tion control system in the horizontal direction, with a spatial res-
olution of 50 mm (Fig. 3A). As the burner injection nozzle has a
20 mm inner diameter, and the ‘scan’ started 1 mm before and
ended 1 mm after the nozzle edge, chemiluminescence spectra of
CH* was acquired at more than 400 points, defined by the entrance
slit of the imaging spectrometer (Fig. 3B). As it can be seen, the
emission intensity captured at each spectral image differs one
another mainly in the height of the signal obtained, following the
conical flame ‘height’ seen by the spectrometer entrance slit.
Finally, flame reconstruction was achieved by combining sequen-
tially narrow wavelength bands (FWHM of the bandhead, less than
1 nm) around 431 nm, of each CH* spectral image, corresponding to
their horizontal positions (Fig. 3C). The reconstructed conical flame
by means of spectral images processing of CH* radical (f ¼ 1:1) is
presented in Fig. 4. Fig. 4. Image reconstruction of CH* radical - f ¼ 1:1.
One of the main advantages of the reconstruction method is the
high spectral resolution, which was less than 1 nm, in comparison
to direct visualization of the excited radicals using an Intensified
CCD camera and interference filters, which normally has band-
widths of 10 nm or more. Another advantage is that other spectral
lines at different wavelengths could have been chosen for each
radical (not necesarily the bandheads), and thus making the spec-
tral reconstruction of the same radicals, but for other wavelengths.
Furthermore, this technique allows the possibility of detecting
other species not easily accessible using direct visualization, by
combining chemiluminescence spectra at different wavelengths, in
the ultraviolet, visible or even infrared regions, depending on the
spectrometer spectral range. Therefore, this technique might be
interesting not only for combustion experimental studies, but for
astrophysics or other applications using spectrometers.
In addition, a direct visualization of CH* radical (f ¼ 1:1) is
presented in Fig. 5. Therefore, by comparing Figs. 4 and 5, one can
note that the flame emission is better captured by the reconstruc- Fig. 5. Direct visualization of CH* radical - f ¼ 1:1.
tion technique, as the color bar shows that the emission intensity is
much stronger (better signal to noise ratio) than the one obtained
with direct visualization (the same ICCD camera was used and time filtering the signal captured by the camera through interference
exposure of visualization was 3 times bigger than that of the filters with transmission coefficients much lower than 100%, and
reconstructed technique). This effect might be due to the fact that making an integration over the filter bandwidth (60% transmission
visualization of excited radicals is performed experimentally by and a 10 nm bandwidth for CH*). In the other hand, the recon-
struction technique doesn't have a ‘filter’ and we focus only on the
spectrum bandhead.
Concerning C2 * radical, the same procedure was realized. The
conical flame reconstruction for C2 * radical is achieved by
combining narrow wavelength bands (less than 1 nm) around

Fig. 3. Flame's spectral reconstruction procedure scheme. Fig. 6. Image reconstruction of C2 * radical- f ¼ 1:1.
232 D. Alviso et al. / International Journal of Thermal Sciences 121 (2017) 228e236

516 nm. The reconstructed conical flame of C2 * radical (f ¼ 1:1) is

presented in Fig. 6.
Also, a direct visualization of C2 * radical (f ¼ 1:1) is presented in
Fig. 7. In these figures one can also note that the flame emission is
better captured by the reconstruction technique (C2 * filter has 75%
transmission and a 30 nm bandwidth).
Concerning OH* radical, the spectral reconstruction procedure
was also performed by combining narrow wavelength bands (less
than 1 nm) around 308 nm. The conical flame reconstruction by
means of spectral images processing of OH* radical for an equiva-
lence ratio of 1.1 is presented in Fig. 8.

4. Validation of the reconstruction method

First, the validation of the proposed technique will be done by Fig. 8. Image reconstruction of OH* radical - f ¼ 1:1.
comparing reconstructed flames and direct visualization images for
CH*, C2 * and OH* species, for different equivalence ratios. Then,
laminar flame speeds will be estimated for reconstructed and
visualization images and compared to those obtained numerically
using a well-known methane chemical mechanism. Finally, radial
profiles of studied species will be presented using also both optical
diagnostic techniques.

4.1. Comparison of reconstructed and direct visualization images

4.1.1. Species CH*

The reconstructed flame using spectral images of CH* radical
(f ¼ 1:1) was presented in Fig. 4. Now, as it was explained in Sec-
tion 2.3, Abel integral inversion was employed in order to obtain a
2D inverted image, and get the thomographic trace of the flame
front in the axisymmetric plane. The Abel Inverted Image of the
reconstructed CH* radical is presented in Fig. 9 (top), whereas that
of CH* radical visualization using an ICCD camera (see Section 2.4)
is presented in Fig. 9 (bottom).
Therefore, by comparing Fig. 9 (top) and (bottom), one can see
that the flame reconstruction and visualization of CH* radical
provide similar results when observing the flame overall shape,
height and angle.
Furthermore, in order to show that the technique is robust,
flame's spectral reconstruction and direct visualization of CH*
radical for equivalence ratios of 0.9, 1.0 and 1.2 are presented in
Figs. 10 and 11, respectively. In these figures, it can be seen that for
all equivalence ratios the proposed reconstruction technique gives
consistent results.

Fig. 9. Abel Inverted Image of CH* radical f ¼ 1:1 using reconstruction technique (top)
and direct visualization (bottom).

4.1.2. Species C2 *
The reconstructed flame using spectral images of C2 * radical
(f ¼ 1:1) was presented in Fig. 6. Abel Inverted Images of flame's
spectral reconstruction and direct visualization of C2 * radical for
equivalence ratios of 1.0, 1.1 and 1.2 are presented in Figs. 12 and 13,
respectively. C2 * emission signal is very weak in lean flames,
therefore C2 * results for f ¼ 0:9 are not shown. In these figures, it
can be seen that for all equivalence ratios the proposed recon-
struction technique gives consistent results, also for C2 * radical.

4.1.3. Species OH*

The reconstructed flame using spectral images of OH* radical
Fig. 7. Direct visualization of C2 * radical - f ¼ 1:1. (f ¼ 1:1) was presented in Fig. 8. Abel Inverted Images of flame's
 D. Alviso et al. / International Journal of Thermal Sciences 121 (2017) 228e236 233

Fig. 10. Image reconstruction of CH* radical - Abel Inverted Images.

Fig. 11. Direct visualization of CH* radical - Abel Inverted Images.

Fig. 12. Image reconstruction of C2 * radical - Abel Inverted Images.

Fig. 13. Direct visualization of C2 * radical - Abel Inverted Images.

spectral reconstruction of OH* radical for equivalence ratios of 0.9, and C2 * radicals, as expected.
1.1 and 1.2 are presented in Fig. 14. For the sake of brevity OH* re- Unfortunately, no direct visualization of the OH* radical are
sults for f ¼ 1:0 are not shown. From these Figures one can see that presented due to the lack of a UV lens for the ICCD camera. How-
images reconstruction of OH* radical are thicker than those for CH* ever, the results of flame's spectral reconstruction for OH* radical
234 D. Alviso et al. / International Journal of Thermal Sciences 121 (2017) 228e236
Fig. 14. Image reconstruction of OH* radical - Abel Inverted Images.
shows that the proposed method is also valid in UV range of
wavelength.
4.2. Laminar flame speed comparison
Experimentally, conical flames stabilize at the position where
the flame velocity matches the flow velocity. Therefore, by using
the flow velocity value (0:9 ms1 ) and the conical flame angle, one
can estimate the flame velocity for each experimental condition.
Conical flame angles have been estimated using Abel Inverted Im-
ages of the studied radicals, using both reconstruction and direct
visualization techniques.
Numerically, the kinetic modeling for methane oxidation in 1-D
freely-propagating flames were performed using the REGATH
package [30e32] developed at EM2C laboratory with detailed
thermochemical and transport properties. The inputs to each
simulation include a chemical kinetic reaction mechanism, a
dataset of thermochemical properties and a dataset of transport
properties. A methane mechanism (Lindstedt et al. [33] including
29 species and 141 reactions) was chosen to carry the simulations.
Methane-air freely-propagating premixed flames operating con-
ditions have been chosen in order to match those of the experi-
mental studies.
Laminar flame speeds using both reconstruction and direct
visualization experimental techniques, as well as the numerical
results are presented in Fig. 15. This figure shows that the experi-
mental results are very close one another, and both are consistent
with the numerical estimation.
4.3. Species radial profiles comparison
In order to show that flames thicknesses of reconstructed
Fig. 15. Experimental and numerical laminar flame speeds as a function of equivalence
ratio.
images are consistent with those of direct visualization images,
radial profiles of the studied species 10 mm above the burner edge
(see Fig. 16) were analized.
For the sake of brevity, only results for CH* and C2 * species radial
profiles for f ¼ 1:2 are presented in Figs. 17 and 18, respectively.
These profiles were normalized in order to make the comparison.
As it can be seen in these figures, CH* and C2 * species radial profiles
are very similar for reconstructed and direct visualization images,
as the thicknesses and positions of the peaks almost match
perfectly.
5. Conclusions
In this work we have focused on a novel reconstruction tech-
nique to obtain images of the spatial distribution of ultraviolet OH*
and visible CH* and C2 * species.
First, a methane-air conical flame was obtained experimentally
in a nozzle type burner. A ‘spectral scan’ was done using the
burner's position control system in the horizontal direction, with a
high spatial resolution. Then, chemiluminescence spectra of stud-
ied species were acquired at each point, defined by the entrance slit
of the imaging spectrometer. Finally, flame reconstruction was
achieved by combining sequentially narrow wavelength bands
(high spectral resolution) around each species bandheads, corre-
sponding to their horizontal positions.
Main advantages of the reconstruction method are: the high
spectral resolution, in comparison to direct visualization of the
excited radicals using an Intensified CCD camera and interference
filters; also, other spectral lines at different wavelengths could have
been chosen for each radical (not necesarily the bandheads), and
thus making the spectral reconstruction of the same radicals, but
Fig. 16. Picture of a typical conical flame. The dashed red line indicates a cut 10 mm
above the burner edge. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure
legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)
 D. Alviso et al. / International Journal of Thermal Sciences 121 (2017) 228e236
Fig. 17. CH* species radial profiles 10 mm above the burner edge - f ¼ 1:2.
Fig. 18. C2 * species radial profiles 10 mm above the burner edge - f ¼ 1:2.
for other wavelengths; in addition, this technique allows the pos-
sibility of detecting other species not easily accessible using direct
visualization, by combining chemiluminescence spectra at different
wavelengths, in the ultraviolet, visible or infrared regions.
Furthermore, this technique might be interesting not only for
combustion experimental studies, but for astrophysics or other
applications using spectrometers.
The validation of the proposed technique was done by
comparing reconstructed flames and direct visualization images for
CH*, C2 * and OH* species, for different equivalence ratios. Also,
laminar flame speeds were estimated for reconstructed and visu-
alization images and compared to those obtained numerically using
a well-known methane chemical mechanism. Finally, radial profiles
of studied species were presented using also both optical diagnostic
techniques.
Although the technique has been applied only in laminar steady
flame condition, it could be interesting for application in more
advanced, laser-sheet based diagnostics.
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank Nasser Darabiha and Philippe
Scouflaire (EM2C laboratory, Centrale Supelec, France) for their
cooperation over the past years and REGATH code, and also Aldo
Mendieta (Otto-von-Guericke-Universitat Magdeburg, Germany)
for performing some experimental studies related to this paper.
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