Imperial College London
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ProfessorKimChristensen

Faculty of Natural Sciences, Department of Physics

Professor of Theoretical Physics
 
 
 
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Contact

 

+44 (0)20 7594 7574k.christensen Website

 
 
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Assistant

 

Mrs Carolyn Dale +44 (0)20 7594 7579

 
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Location

 

812Blackett LaboratorySouth Kensington Campus

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Summary

 

Publications

Citation

BibTex format

@article{Fernandez-Anez:2019:10.1103/PhysRevE.99.023314,
author = {Fernandez-Anez, N and Christensen, K and Frette, V and Rein, G},
doi = {10.1103/PhysRevE.99.023314},
journal = {Physical Review E: Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics},
title = {Simulation of fingering behavior in smoldering combustion using a cellular automaton},
url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.99.023314},
volume = {99},
year = {2019}
}
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RIS format (EndNote, RefMan)

TY  - JOUR
AB  - Smoldering is the slow, low-temperature, flameless burning of porous fuels and the most persistent type of combustion phenomena. It is a complex physical process that is not yet completely understood, but it is known that it is driven by heat transfer, mass transfer, and fuel chemistry. A specific case of high interest and complexity is fingering behavior. Fingering is an instability that occurs when a thin fuel layer burns against an oxygen current. These instabilities appear when conduction rather than convection is the dominant mode of heat transfer to the fuel ahead and the availability of oxygen is limited during the combustion of a thin fuel, such as paper. The pattern of the fingers can be characterized through the distance between them and their width, and can be classified into three different regimes: isolated fingers, tip-splitting fingers, or no fingers forming and a smooth continuous front. In this paper, a multilayer cellular automaton based on three governing principles (heat, oxygen, and fuel) is shown to reproduce all the regimes and the details of finger structures observed in previous experiments. It is shown how when oxygen is not limited, a smooth smoldering front is formed. If the oxygen speed decreases beyond a critical value, fingers appear first as tip-splitting fingers and later as isolated fingers, increasing the distance between them and decreasing their thickness. The oxygen consumed during oxidation influences these critical values with a positive correlation. This cellular automaton provides an alternative approach to simulate smoldering combustion in large systems over long times. That the model is able to reproduce the complex pattern formation seen in a fingering experiment validates the model. In the future, we could apply the model in various other geometries to make predictions on the outcome of smoldering combustion processes.
AU  - Fernandez-Anez,N
AU  - Christensen,K
AU  - Frette,V
AU  - Rein,G
DO  - 10.1103/PhysRevE.99.023314
PY  - 2019///
SN  - 1539-3755
TI  - Simulation of fingering behavior in smoldering combustion using a cellular automaton
T2  - Physical Review E: Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.99.023314
UR  - http://gateway.webofknowledge.com/gateway/Gateway.cgi?GWVersion=2&SrcApp=PARTNER_APP&SrcAuth=LinksAMR&KeyUT=WOS:000459916000011&DestLinkType=FullRecord&DestApp=ALL_WOS&UsrCustomerID=1ba7043ffcc86c417c072aa74d649202
UR  - http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/73454
VL  - 99
ER  -
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