Stochastic fields/LES of partially-premixed lean hydrogen flames with swirl-axial air injection
File(s)
Published version
Author(s)
Liu, Weiyue
Jones, William
Morgans, Aimee
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Turbulent hydrogen flames with varying operating conditions in the swirl-axial air injection AHEAD combustor were studied computationally with a multi-regime flame closure method, combustion LES / Stochastic fields. The method was validated by comparisons with measurements in isothermal and reacting flows. The velocity fields, flames, mixing fields and thermo-chemical states were analysed in detail. Further comparisons were carried out for different operating conditions to study the effect of global equivalence ratio and axial air injection ratio. On the one hand, it introduces higher axial momentum, which restricts flashback. On the other hand, increasing the global equivalence ratio or axial air injection ratio negatively affects the spatial mixing quality where the axial momentum flux plays an important role. The results also suggest that thermochemical states are dominantly controlled by the global equivalence ratio rather than the inlet reactant temperature or flow conditions. The effect of differential diffusion was also studied. Differential diffusion slightly increases the possibility of the upstream occurrence of the flame inner branch, which results in the
inner flame branch brush becoming broader. This was found to be related to the changes of the upstream mixing field due to differential diffusion. Nevertheless,
the global system is negligibly influenced by differential diffusion due to the high Reynolds number.
inner flame branch brush becoming broader. This was found to be related to the changes of the upstream mixing field due to differential diffusion. Nevertheless,
the global system is negligibly influenced by differential diffusion due to the high Reynolds number.
Date Issued
2026-03-12
Date Acceptance
2026-02-20
Citation
Flow, Turbulence and Combustion, 2026, 116 (1)
ISSN
1386-6184
Publisher
Springer
Journal / Book Title
Flow, Turbulence and Combustion
Volume
116
Issue
1
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s) 2026. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
License URL
Identifier
10.1007/s10494-026-00736-0
Subjects
Hydrogen flame
Swirling flame
Differential diffusion
Stochastic fields
LES
Publication Status
Published
Article Number
40
Date Publish Online
2026-03-12