Overview
Research Interests
The research activities of Dr. Campobasso include the design, implementation and demonstration of innovative Computational Fluid Dynamics technologies aimed at improving modern engineering design. He and his group develop accurate and ultra-fast high-fidelity multidisciplinary analysis and design systems using the Navier-Stokes equations as the main computational aerodynamics tool. His recent research work includes the development of frequency-domain CFD solvers for the rapid analysis of unsteady periodic flows and general fluid/structure interaction problems, the development of integrated aerostructural design optimization systems for wind turbine applications, the development of low-speed preconditioning methods for the analysis of flows featuring both high- and very-low-speed regions by means of compressible Navier-Stokes solvers, the development of novel farfield boundary conditions for the analysis of the flow field in complex turbomachinery geometries, and the investigation of hybrid parallelization technologies based on the combination of shared- and distributed-memory parallel computing.
The main engineering areas in which Dr. Campobasso uses these technologies are the analysis of horizontal and vertical axis wind turbine unsteady aerodynamics and aeroelasticity, the analysis of the unsteady aerodynamics of oscillating wings for the extraction of energy from an oncoming air or water stream, and the multidisciplinary design optimisation of wind- and water-flow energy-conversion systems. Dr. Campobasso also developed lower fidelity methods for the conceptual and preliminary integrated multidisciplinary analysis and design of several renewable energy systems. An itemized list of his research interests and activities is provided below.
- Wind and tidal energy, including machine analysis and design, and tidal array and wind farm energy efficiency assessments.
- Advanced turbulence and transition modelling.
- Harmonic Balance (HB) Reynolds-average Navier-Stokes (RANS) solver for open rotor, turbomachinery blade and aircraft wing unsteady aerodynamics and aeroelasticity.
- Adjoint CFD methods for sensitivity and uncertainty analysis, and design optimization.
- Uncertainty modelling and robust design optimization of wind turbines.
- Low-speed preconditioning for compressible steady, time- and frequency-domain RANS solvers.
- Hybrid shared- and distributed-memory parallelization of HB RANS solvers.
- Turbomachinery aeroelasticity and unsteady aerodynamics.
- Krylov subspace solvers for CFD and other large-scale computational systems.
Expertise
Dr. Campobasso and his group have substantial expertise in the development and use of time- and frequency-domain Navier-Stokes CFD, featuring both multi-block structured and unstructured finite volume methods. He has knowledge and hands-on experience in the design and development of adjoint Navier-Stokes solvers for aerodynamic design. He also specializes in the design and implementation of robust low-speed preconditioning for the compressible Navier-Stokes equations, and the implementation and use of advanced turbulence modelling capabilities. He also has expertise in parallel computing using distributed- and shared-memory approaches, and hybrid paradigms obtained by combining distributed- and shared-memory parallelizations to maximize the exploitation of new multi- and many-core computing hardware.
On the application side, Dr. Campobasso has expertise in wind and tidal current turbine steady and unsteady fluid dynamics, aeroelasticity, and blade stress analysis. His ongoing projects include the assessment of the impact of yawed and sheared wind on multi-megawatt wind turbine loads and power, and the concurrent development of high- and low-fidelity analysis codes for the design of cross-flow turbines, such as Darrieus turbines. He has also wide expertise and knowledge of turbomachinery blade sub- and transonic steady and unsteady aerodynamics, structural mechanics and aeroelasticity, including blade flutter and force response, structural mistuning and its effects on bladed assembly aeroelasticity, disk and blade attachment stress and fatigue analysis, and aerodynamic and structural turbomachinery blade design. He also specializes in the application of uncertainty propagation and robust optimization to wind turbine design, and his publications on probabilistic wind turbine design accounting for stochastically distributed manufacturing and assembly errors are the first ones in this area.