DNS of turbulent head-on quenching of premixed H₂/air and NH₃/H₂/air flames in fully developed turbulent channel flows

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Description

Direct numerical simulations (DNS) of turbulent head-on quenching of premixed H₂/air and NH₃/H₂/air flames in fully developed turbulent channel flows at friction Reynolds number Reτ ≈ 300 were conducted. Both adiabatic and isothermal walls were considered. There are several objectives of these DNS simulations: (1) to examine near-wall flame dynamics and combustion regime variations [1]; (2) to investigate the effect of differential diffusion on quenching characteristics [2]; (3) to analyze pollutant emission characteristics for near-wall flames [3]; (4) to examine the near-wall flame marker [4] The dataset includes approximately 10 snapshots per flame configuration, spanning from flame initiation to complete flame quenching.

The DNS were performed using the in-house low-Mach combustion solver DINO [5]. The detailed NH₃ mechanism [6] and H₂ mechanism [7] were applied for NH₃/H₂/air and H₂/air flames, respectively. The mixture-averaged diffusion model was used for molecular transport. The governing equations were solved using:

  • Spatial discretization: 6th order centered finite difference method
  • Temporal discretization: 4th order Runge-Kutta explicit method

Non-reacting channel flows were first simulated until wall turbulence was fully developed. The channel has streamwise (x), wall-normal (y), and spanwise (z) lengths of 5h, 2h, and 2h, respectively, where h = 5 mm is the half-channel width. For hydrogen flames, the streamwise length is extended to 20h. Two identical flame fronts (mapped from 1D unstretched freely propagating flame solutions) are then initiated at y = 0.5h and y = 1.5h, with burned gases in the channel center and flames propagating toward the top and bottom cold walls. The hydrogen flames are simulated with a grid resolution Δx⁺=2.71 (uniformly 48.4 μm), Δz⁺=2.189 (uniformly 39.1 μm), and 0.437≤Δy⁺≤1.635 (stretched grids in the wall-normal direction from 7.8-29.2 μm). The ammonia/hydrogen flames are simulated with a grid resolution Δx⁺=2.023 (uniformly 32.3 μm), Δz⁺=2.448 (uniformly 39.1 μm), and 0.326≤Δy⁺≤1.215 (stretched grids in the wall-normal direction from 5.2-19.4 μm).

Parameter Case HI Case AI Case HA Case AA
uτ (m/s) 6.40 5.13 6.40 5.13
l* (μm) 17.86 15.97 17.86 15.97
Reτ 280 313 280 313
Daw 0.167 0.004 0.167 0.004
α (H2 vol. ratio) 1.0 0.2 1.0 0.2
ϕ 1.5 1.0 1.5 1.0
Tu (K) 750 750 750 750
Tw (K) ISO 750 ISO 750 AD AD
SL (m/s) 14.54 0.843 14.54 0.843
δL (mm) 0.243 0.661 0.243 0.661
tw (μs) 2.79 3.11 2.79 3.11
tL (μs) 16.7 784 16.7 784

Notation: uτ — friction velocity; l* = ν/uτ — viscous length scale; ν — kinematic viscosity; Reτ = huτ/ν — friction Reynolds number; Daw = tw/tL — wall Damköhler number; tw = ν/uτ² and tL = δL/SL — wall and flame time scales; SL, δL — laminar flame speed and thickness; α — fuel H₂ volume ratio; ϕ — equivalence ratio; Tu, Tw — unburned and wall temperatures; ISO — isothermal wall; AD — adiabatic wall.


Quick Info

Case Fuel Wall Grid Size (GB) Links
HI H2 Isothermal 2048×513×256 121 Kaggle, info.json
HA H2 Adiabatic 2048×513×256 181 Kaggle, info.json
AI NH3/H2 Isothermal 768×769×256 85 Kaggle, info.json
AA NH3/H2 Adiabatic 768×769×256 102 Kaggle, info.json

References

[1] C. Chi, B. Cuenot, D. Thévenin, Turbulent flame-wall interaction: dynamics of flame thickness and combustion regime, J. Fluid Mech. 1029 (2026) A5.
[2] C. Chi, C. Yu, B. Cuenot, U. Maas, D. Thévenin, Effect of differential diffusion on head-on quenching of premixed NH₃/H₂/air flames within turbulent boundary layers, Proc. Combust. Inst. 40 (2024) 105276.
[3] C. Chi, Flame dynamic insights into emission characteristics of NH₃/H₂/air combustion in turbulent boundary layers, Combust. Flame 269 (2024) 113723.
[4] C. Chen, C. Chi, W. Han, L. Yang, D. Thévenin, A flame marker for ammonia/hydrogen/air premixed flames during flame/wall interactions, Proc. Combust. Inst. 41 (2025) 105935.
[5] A. Abdelsamie, G. Fru, T. Oster, F. Dietzsch, G. Janiga, D. Thévenin, Towards direct numerical simulations of low-Mach number turbulent reacting and two-phase flows using immersed boundaries, Comput. Fluids 131 (2016) 123–141.
[6] Y. Jiang, A. Gruber, K. Seshadri, F. Williams, An updated short chemical-kinetic nitrogen mechanism for carbon-free combustion applications, Int. J. Energy Res. 44(2) (2020) 795–810.
[7] J. Li, Z. Zhao, A. Kazakov, F.L. Dryer, An updated comprehensive kinetic model of hydrogen combustion, Int. J. Chem. Kinet. 36(10) (2004) 566–575.

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