Investigation of Dynamic Shock-Vortex Interactions in Compressible Low Reynolds Number Flows on 3D Wings

As the Martian environment combines very low atmospheric density with a lower than Earth speed of sound, rotorcrafts such as NASA’s Ingenuity craft operate in a unique compressible low Reynolds Number (Re) flow regime. Previous research conducted by the authors showcased a new phenomenon called dynamic shock-vortex interactions in which vortices created during dynamic stall events interacted with shocks formed during forced oscillation tests. The qualitative behavior of the phenomenon was characterized in the aforementioned study along with the characterization of the phenomenon with respect to Mach and reduced frequency variations for a NACA 0012 airfoil through the use of unsteady RANS simulations. The presented work will expand on the authors’ previous work be extending the analysis of these dynamic shock vortex interactions to 3D straight wings using LES methods. The span wise evolution of these dynamic shock-vortex interactions as well as the determination of the driving mechanisms involved in the formulation, transportation, and dissipation of these interactions will be of main focus.