Seminars of Interest

Abstract

Next-generation propulsion and power systems must operate reliably on a wide range of carbon-free and carbon-neutral fuels. Achieving this goal requires deeper insight into the coupled processes that govern fuel–air mixing, ignition, flame propagation, and combustion stability across diverse fuel chemistries. This presentation introduces a diagnostics-guided research framework that combines high-fidelity optical measurements with reduced-order modeling to isolate and interpret the dominant physics in advanced combustion systems. The talk begins with systematic studies of hydrogen combustion in internal combustion engine platforms, where state-of-the-art optical diagnostics provide spatio-temporally resolved measurements of key reacting-flow phenomena. When paired with reactor-based analyses, these measurements reveal the controlling chemical and thermodynamic mechanisms and enable the development of simplified predictive models. The framework is then extended to more complex fuels, including oxygenated e-fuels and sustainable aviation fuels, where reactor-network modeling provides a bridge between detailed experimental observations and physics-based reduced-order descriptions of overall combustion behavior. Collectively, these efforts form the foundation of a diagnostics-anchored framework for interpreting emerging fuel chemistries and enabling the design of robust, efficient, and fuel-flexible low-carbon propulsion and power systems.

 About the Speaker

Dr. Rajavasanth Rajasegar is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the Colorado School of Mines. His research combines advanced optical diagnostics and reduced-order modeling to investigate ignition, mixing, and combustion dynamics in fuel-flexible propulsion and power-generation systems. Through high-fidelity, spatio-temporally resolved measurements, his work seeks to uncover the fundamental physics governing combustion processes relevant to carbon-free and carbon-neutral fuels. Dr. Rajasegar received his Ph.D. in Mechanical Science and Engineering from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and subsequently served as a postdoctoral researcher at the Combustion Research Facility at Sandia National Laboratories before joining the faculty at Mines.

Hosts: Professor Kyle Smith, Professor Leonardo Chamorro, Professor Elif Ertekin