MAE Seminar: Tiegang Fang

Title:

Spray and Combustion for Sustainable Power and Transportation

Abstract: 

Clean engine combustion is inescapable for sustainable power and transportation systems. In this talk, clean combustion under both compression-ignition and spark-ignition engine conditions will be presented. New combustion mode like gasoline compression-ignition will also be covered for high reactivity gasoline fuels. Experimental investigations of spray combustion were performed both in an optically accessible engine and an optical constant volume combustion chamber. The combustion and soot processes were visualized and quantified through the application of advanced non-intrusive diagnostic techniques for different fuels including biodiesel and biomass to liquid fuels. Flame structure under different modes were studied. Finally, flash boiling hollow cone spray and its combustion will be considered, and novel combustion phenomenon will be demonstrated. Supercritical fuel injection, liquid ammonia spray, and Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) combustion will also be briefly discussed.

Bio: 

Tiegang Fang is a professor and a University Faculty Scholar in the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department at NC State University. He earned his BE degree from the Automotive Engineering Department with a minor from the Computer Science and Technology Department at Tsinghua University (Beijing). Before receiving his PhD from the University of Illinois at Urbana, he obtained his MS degree from the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering department at Rutgers University. His research interests include internal combustion engines, low carbon fuels, engine combustion, liquid atomization and spray, and optical diagnostics. He has published more than 170 journal papers. He received the 2013 Alcoa Foundation Engineering Research Achievement Award from the College of Engineering at NC State University, the Ralph R. Teetor Educational Award from SAE International in 2014, and was elected to a University Faculty Scholar at NC State in 2020. He is a Fellow of ASME, a member of the Combustion Institute, SAE, and the Institute for Liquid Atomization and Spray Systems (ILASS). He currently serves as an associate editor for five journals including the ASME Journal of Engineering for Gas Turbines and Power and the SAE International Journal on Engines. He is also the Colloquium Co-Chair of the 40th (2024) and 41st 2026) International Symposium on Combustion.