Multi-Physics Simulation Tool for Rapid Heat Damage Assessment of Polymer Composite Aircraft Structures

The goal of this effort is to estimate the residual strength of composites exposed to over- temperature events.  Proposed is a physics-based, multi-dimensional simulation software to quantify the system-level response of composites exposed to heating via thermal and structural modeling. A computational framework, jointly developed by Reaction Engineering and the University of Buffalo for over 15 years, will be utilized to perform the thermal and mechanical computations.  The framework is uniquely positioned to address the stated problem and fully capture the required physics of conjugate heat & mass transfer, accurate & fast chemistry, structural response of composite materials, and complex geometry to accurately predict the time dependent temperature distribution and residual strength.  The final result of the proposed work effort will be an advanced modeling and simulation software package augmented with machine learning to predict the residual strength of heat damaged composites with very high accuracy.