03/22/2022
By Noah Van Dam

The Mechanical Engineering Department welcomes Prof. Dimitris Assanis from Stony Brook University as part of the department's research seminar series on Thursday, March 24, 2022 at 1 p.m.

This seminar will be held in Shah 310. Please contact Prof. Noah Van Dam for additional details.

Abstract:
Internal combustion engines (ICE) have been around for more than 100 years and have proven to be one of the most commonly used thermochemical energy conversion devices. However, recent climate initiatives and decarbonization efforts have forced the need to re-examine, decrease and eliminate our dependence on fossil fuels. The Advanced Combustion and Energy Systems (ACES) Laboratory has been working on re-envisioning the ICE through: (i) the development and use of novel engine architectures to improve energy extraction, (ii) to uncover advanced combustion modes to boost fuel conversion efficiency, and (iii) the use of alternative, low-carbon, carbon-neutral, and carbon-free fuels to reduce carbon intensity. For us to be successful in the efforts we undertake to improve combustion and drastically reduce emissions of the ICE, we not only rely on detailed physical experimentation, but also require complementary computational modeling to digitally look inside the combustion chamber.

In particular, we strive to experimentally and computationally understand the complex interactions between turbulent fluid motion and the combustion chemistry of alternative low-carbon and carbon neutral fuels (compressed natural gas, syngas, hydrogen, ammonia, and naphthenic biofuels) to improve fuel-air mixing, ignition, and combustion in advanced combustion engines. Ultimately, understanding the next wave of advanced combustion of net-zero carbon and carbon-free fuels is critical to unlocking a greener pathway for the hard-to-decarbonize sectors and ensuring the ICE has another 100 years of life left in it.

Biography:
Dimitris Assanis joined the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Stony Brook University as an Assistant Professor in January 2020. Previously he received his PhD, MS and BS degrees in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Michigan and completed a postdoc at the University of Delaware on an ARPA-E NEXTCAR project.

Assanis is the Director of the Advanced Combustion and Energy Systems Laboratory at SBU and has over 15 years of experience in the field of fuels and combustion. Specifically, the focus of his expertise lies within fuel injection systems, fuel-air mixture preparation, ignition systems, combustion performance and emissions analysis. Assanis is a patent-holding inventor and has also been quoted in WIRED magazine. The ultimate goal of his group’s efforts is to improve the efficiency of energy conversion, power generation and propulsion systems, while reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

He currently leads a Department of Energy Bioenergy Technologies Office funded project to develop a naphthenic biofuel suitable for up to 50% replacement of No.2 Diesel fuel; and a project Office of Naval Research with Prof. Noah Van Dam, Prof. Hunter Mack, and Prof. Juan Pablo Trelles to demonstrate an advanced dual fuel combustion strategy with zero-carbon fuel blends (Ammonia and Hydrogen) and traditional Navy logistics fuels (F-76 and JP-5).