Dominik James M.Sc.

Research

Our research focuses on the simulation of high-enthalpy flows such as the atmospheric reentry of a hypersonic vehicle. The research is conducted in close collaboration with IABG mbH, a German engineering firm in the automotive, aerospace, defense and security sector. My aim is to develop, implement, and use computational fluid mechanics tools to estimate aerothermodynamic loads on such a vehicle.

We have recently generated solutions for a generic 3D hypersonic glide vehicle at various inflow conditions and angles of attack. In addition, radiation calculations for the FIRE II capsule have been completed.

Generic HGV Geometry	Comparison of 0 and 20 degree angle of attack - temperature profile with streamlines and Mach lines	Radiation heat flux of FIRE II

Tools and Methods

KEGS:

• Coupled second-order boundary-layer/ Euler method written in Fortran
• Can do 2D and 3D
• Perfect gas, equilibrium and 5-species chemical non-equilibrium gas models
• Finite difference method in space with shock-fitting
• Automatic mesh generation for given surface mesh of an object
• Explicit Runge-Kutta time integration
• Laminar and turbulent flows with predefined transition location
• Photon Monte-Carlo Method for radiation computation in the flow field
• Due to the numerical efficiency very suitable to analyze envelopes or do design work

Hyperparameter Optimization: Bayesian optimization algorithm to optimize film cooling trench designs in collaboration with Lukas Fischer.

Tools: Tecplot, ICEM, Git, CATIA, Slurm, Visual Studio, Eclipse, Anaconda and more.

Languages: Mostly Fortran, Python, and MATLAB.

Current Work

Implementation of thermal nonequilibrium into KEGS. Radiation calculations of the flow field. Mesh and convergence study.

Conferences

• planned: 3AF IAMD15 in 2023
• Ch. Mundt, D. James; Photon Monte Carlo Transport Computation For Atmospheric (Re-)Entry; RHTG 9 workshop, 2022
• D. Hauger, Prof. Ch . Mundt; Studie über aerothermodynamische Lasten eines hypersonischen Gleiters; Angewandte Forschung für Verteidigung und Sicherheit in Deutschland conference of DWT, 2022
• D. Hauger, J. Bonin, Ch. Mundt; A Study of Aerothermodynamic Loads on Hypersonic Glide Vehicles; 3AF IAMD14 conference, 2021

Theses

• M.Sc.: Modeling Of Reynolds Stress Tensor with Embedded Galilean Invariance using a Supervised Deep Learning Algorithm
• B.Sc.: Optimierung und Kalibrierung eines numerischen Modells zur Beschreibung der kinetischen Prozesse bei der Adsorption von Methanol in Aktivkohle-Formkörpern

Teaching and Students

Teaching: Winter trimester 2023 --- Übung zu Nichtgleichgewichtsthermodynamik

Topics for theses and student projects: Numerical simulation (CFD) of high-enthalpy flows, such as atmospheric reentry. Reach out to me by email! If this topic isn't for you but you are generally interested in our institute check out current openings, or contact Colum Walter.

Bio

Dominik Tobias James, formerly Hauger, is a doctoral research assistant of Prof. Mundt at the Institute of Thermodynamics, Bundeswehr University Munich. His research focuses on the simulation of high-enthalpy flows such as the atmospheric reentry of a hypersonic vehicle.

He completed his B.Sc. in aerospace engineering at the University of Stuttgart in 2016. In the same year he joined Purdue University as a Fulbright scholar. In 2018, he received his M.Sc. in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering, with a minor in Computational Science and Engineering. He then worked for two years on machine learning applied to CFD in the Computational Fluid Dynamics and Heat Transfer Lab of Prof. Shih.

You can find more information on LinkedIn.