UC San Diego

Crossflow instability is primary cause of boundary-layer transition on swept wings used in high-speed applications. Delaying the downstream location of transition would drastically reduce the viscous drag over the wing surface, and subsequently improves the overall aircraft efficiency. By studying the development of instability growth rates and how they interact with the surroundings, researchers can control the crossflow transition location. Experiments on the 35° swept-wing model were performed in the NASA Langley 20-Inch Supersonic Wind Tunnel with Mach 2.0 flow conditions and 20 [mu]m tall discrete roughness elements (DRE) with varying spacing placed along the leading edge. Fluorene was used as the sublimating chemical in the surface flow visualization technique to observe the transition front and stationary crossflow vortex patterns in the laminar flow region. Spatial spectral decomposition was completed on high-resolution images of sublimating chemical runs using a newly developed image processing technique. Streamwise evolution of the vortex track wavelengths within the laminar boundary-layer region was observed. The spectral information was averaged to produce dominant modes present throughout the laminar region