College of Science & Engineering
Twin Cities
This group focuses on the numerical simulation of complex gas flows for which the molecular nature of the gas must be explicitly accounted for. Such problems include gas-surface interactions and non-equilibrium flows found in both hypersonics and micro-flows.
The group specializes in particle simulation methods such as direct simulation Monte Carlo (DSMC), kinetic Monte Carlo (KMC), and molecular dynamics (MD). Research is split between algorithm development and physical model development for these numerical methods. Research is also focused on coupling these methods with each other and with continuum (CFD) methods in order to efficiently simulate practical flows of engineering interest from a molecular perspective. Such particle methods have the potential to incorporate increasingly realistic and accurate physical models but require significant computational resources, necessitating the use of MSI.