A $7,857,568 contract awarded this week to the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) from the Air Force Space and Missile Command will enable three Georgia Tech School of Aerospace Engineering faculty to develop design tools that will assist the United States in predicting combustion instability in its spacecraft.
“Ultimately, this will enable the United States to stop using Russian combustion technology,” said Georgia Tech Regents’ Professor Krish Ahuja, the project’s principal investigator. “We are very excited about this important project, and deeply grateful for the opportunity to make direct contributions to the rocket propulsion industry in the United States.”
Joining Ahuja in this 2-year research enterprise will be William R.T. Oakes Professor and School Chair Vigor Yang, Georgia Tech Strategic Energy Institute Director and Aerospace Professor Timothy Lieuwen, and Professor Bill Anderson from Purdue University’s School of Aeronautics and Astronautics.
The group will focus on developing a suite of software-based design tools for predicting and analyzing stability characteristics of combustion devices based on hydrocarbon-fueled, oxidizer-rich staged combustion rocket engine cycles. Their research is expected to be completed in 2017.
Source: http://gtri.gatech.edu/casestudy/air-force-smc-awards-gtri-78-million-contract
