Visualizing Turbulent Combustion Simulations

Visualization of stoichiometric mixture fraction, scalar dissipation and OH radical mass fraction variables. To understand and verify the complex combustion processes in turbulent flames, the capability to visualize two or more scalars is very much needed. Conventional visualization tools do not support such a capability directly. Scientists often have to make side-by-side comparison of images of different variables by hand, which is a tedious and time-consuming process. Furthermore, the information that scientists can derive through looking at separate images is quite limited. We have developed a set of interactive techniques for simultaneous visualization of multiple time-varying variables, which enable combustion scientists to validate and gain improved understanding of their simulations.

The simulation was done by E. R. Hawkes and J. H. Chen, Sandia National Laboratories. The visualization was done by H. Akiba and K.-L. Ma, University of California at Davis.