A COMPREHENSIVE PNS UPGRADE FOR THREE-DIMENSIONAL REENTRY FLOW PREDICTION

THE MISSION OF THIS PHASE I PROJECT IS COMPLETION OF A TRULY INNOVATIVE STUDY TO UPGRADE EXISTING PNS CODES FOR COMPUTING HIGHSPEED, THREE-DIMENSIONAL RE-ENTRY FLOWFIELDS. THE PLAN OF ACTION ENCOMPASSES A THOROUGH EXAMINATION OF THE RANGE OF ADMISSABLE CFD THEORIES, TO UNEQUIVACALLY COMPARE STRONG AND WEAK POINTS FOR APPLICATION TO THE REYNOLDS-AVERAGED NAVIER-STOKES EQUATIONS WITH DIFFERENTIAL EQUATION TURBULENT CLOSURE MODEL. THE END-GOAL IS TO DEVELOP, FOR THIS HIGHLY NON-LINEAR NON-HOMOGENEOUS EQUATION SYSTEM, A SUPERIOR STABILITY ALGORITHM FREE OF DELETERIOUS NUMERICAL VISCOSITY EFFECTS, WITH PARTICULAR EMPHASIS ON HIGH-ORDER ACCURACY AT AERODYNAMIC BOUNDARY SURFACES, INTRINSIC ADMISSION OF HIGHER-ORDER TURBULENCE CLOSURE MODELS, INCLUSION OF REAL GAS EFFECTS, WITH ANTICIPATED EXTENSION TO CHEMICALLY REACTION/NON-EQUILIBIRUM FLOWS. THE RESULTANT CFD ALGORITHM WILL EXHIBIT ARBITRARY GRID CAPABILITIES AND BE HIGHLY TAILORED FOR EFFICIENT IMPLEMENTATION IN A MULTI-TASKING SUPERCOMPUTER AND/OR PARALLEL PROCESSING ENVIRONMENT.