Research Theme:
Atmospheric Icing is an unavoidable natural hazard, over the years the aerospace industry has developed detection technologies, anti/de-icing technologies and employed them in most aircraft thus enabling them to fly through most frequent cloud encounters termed as Appendix. C clouds contain droplets up to 100 µm. However, there have been other reported encounters with cloud containing droplets over 100µm to 2000 µm termed as App. O. Even the most modern aircraft have no means of detecting App. O clouds and the accreting ice is beyond the ability of the existing Ice Protection Systems resulting in unfortunate incidents. The present knowledge in SLD icing is very limited, to bridge the gap European Union has commissioned two projects SENS4ICE and ICE-GENESIS, the former deals new detection technologies and the later deals with fundamentals of SLD icing and numerical model development.
Research Focus:
Upgrading, calibrating and quantifying the BIWT for App. O conditions. The lack of suitable instrumentation poses a challenge in the calibration. The collaboration of CIRA, CU, DLR, ONERA and RV enabled us to be one of the few calibrated SLD capable IWTs in the world. However, there are still uncertainties in the droplet temperature. My research focusses on the micron level super cooled droplet temperature and the subsequent heat transfer on accretion, the most critical aspects of the SLD icing.