Exploiting fluid-structure interactions using flexible structures and actuation can improve operational performance in many ocean engineering applications, including biologically inspired swimming and morphing hydrofoils. In this talk, I will present our contributions to two open challenges in this realm. First, performing efficient high-fidelity simulation of such fluid-structure interaction phenomena requires robust treatment of moving boundaries and interfaces in large 3D domains characterized by wide spatiotemporal scale separations. I will present our numerical methodology for addressing these challenges, combining for the first time high-order immersed methods, high-order grid adaptation techniques, and large-scale parallel computing. I will also discuss the extension of the proposed immersed method to both linear and nonlinear elasticity problems, providing a new approach for solving solid mechanics problems using high-order immersed finite-difference techniques. Second, I will discuss our progress towards solving inverse fluid-structure interaction problems for optimal design and control, combining CFD and machine learning techniques. A specific focus is to handle the high-dimensional structure-actuation parameter space facilitated by modern developments in smart materials and structures, which prohibits brute-force optimization or control approaches. Our proposed approach relies on using our numerical solvers to train a shape-loading surrogate model that accelerates the solution of inverse problems in flexible foils. Overall, these advances enable fast, high-accuracy solutions to both forward and inverse problems in unsteady flow-body interactions.

Bio: 

Wim M. van Rees is Associate Professor in the department of Mechanical Engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He received his BSc and MSc from Delft University of Technology in Marine Technology, and his PhD from ETH Zurich in 2014 in Computational Science and Engineering. In 2015 he performed research as a postdoctoral fellow in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Harvard University on the mechanics and design of shape-shifting structures. Wim joined the MIT faculty in 2017, where he received Early Career awards from the Department of Energy in 2020, and from the Army Research Office in 2021.