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Xiaomin Chen
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Aerospace and Structural Engineering
Washington University in St. Louis
Advisor: Dr. Ramesh K. Agarwal
Abstract
In recent years, the airfoil sections with blunt trailing edge (called flatback airfoils)
have been proposed for the inboard regions of large wind-turbine blades because they
provide several structural and aerodynamic performance advantages. In this paper,
we employ a genetic algorithm (GA) for shape optimization of flatback airfoils for
generating maximum lift to drag ratio. The commercially available software
FLUENT is used for calculation of the flow field using the Reynolds-Averaged
Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations in conjunctio n with a turbulence model. It is shown
that the GA optimization technique is capable of accurately and efficiently finding
globally optimal flatback airfoils.
Xiaomin Chen is a doctoral student in the department of Mechanical, Aerospace and
Structural Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis. He is working on his doctoral
dissertation in the area of shape optimization.
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