Published: Sept. 9, 2022

John FarnsworthJohn Farnsworth
Assistant Professor, Smead Aerospace
Thursday, Sept. 15 | 3:00 P.M. | AERO 111

Abstract: The safe flight of small unmanned aircraft or drones in gusty environments, the use of aeroelastically sensitive aircraft for communications and remote networking, and the efficient generation of renewable energy from wind turbines operating around obstacles and terrain are all directly limited by our understanding and control of unsteady, three-dimensional aerodynamic phenomena. My research group, the Experimental Aerodynamics Laboratory (xAero Lab), focuses generally in the areas of unsteady aerodynamics and flow control applied to aerospace vehicles and wind energy systems, however we have more recently applied our expertise to study select environmental flow problems including the forced evaporation in soils and the flame dynamics in wildland fires. Our approach is to elucidate the physical dynamics of complex three-dimensional unsteady flows through well controlled experimental investigations with a broad selection of conventional and optical fluid dynamic measurement techniques and uniquely designed facilities and experimental apparatus. I will provide an overview of ongoing basic research efforts in the xAero Lab related to each of these application areas.

Biography: John Farnsworth is an Assistant Professor in the Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder (CU), where he leads the Experimental Aerodynamics Laboratory (xAero Lab). Prior to joining CU in 2014, he was a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Department of Aeronautics at the United States Air Force Academy. He received his Ph.D. in Aeronautical Engineering from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) in 2011, where he also received both his B.S. and M.S. in Aeronautical Engineering, respectively in 2006 and 2007. His research interests lie in the areas of unsteady aerodynamics, fluid-structure interactions, turbulence, and the application experimental measurement techniques in fluid dynamics.

 

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