Interview with Dr. Bill Pitz - Chemical Mechanisms for Computer Modeling
An expert with 25 years of experience in the field of fuel chemistry and chemical kinetics, Dr. Pitz addresses these questions in my interview with him:
- Why are chemical mechanisms relevant? Who should study them and why?
- From a kinetecist point of view a mechanism can never be proven to be correct, only shown to be incorrect. What is the point of testing mechanisms against experimental data? Would they always be “incorrect” and is it better to just stick to experiments?
- Could computations that use chemical mechanisms ever be useful?
- What is the difference between detailed and reduced chemistry mechanisms? What do you see as being the biggest challenge in obtaining reduced mechanisms?
- What is the biggest misconception that engineers have about chemical mechanisms?
- What is the biggest challenge in reactive flow simulation and modeling?
- If you had to give one piece of advice to an engineer who is thinking of adding some reactive flow modeling to his research and is looking for mechanisms – what would it be?
Dr. Pitz Bio:
Dr. Pitz received his Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, under the supervision of Professor Robert F. Sawyer. He received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in engineering science from Purdue University. He has been developing chemical kinetic mechanisms for hydrocarbon fuels and alternative fuels at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory for over 25 years. He has been using these mechanisms to study applied problems of ignition and pollutant emissions from HCCI and diesel engines, and engine knock in spark ignition engines. For his work, he has received the Horning Award and the Cowell Merit Award from the society of automotive engineers.
(Click on “play” button to listen tot he 35 minute interview. If you are not able to listen, make sure that Quicktime plug-in is installed)
Enjoy!
Masha
P.S. I would LOVE your to hear what you want to see on this blog in the future! Please suggest any interviews that you think might be valuable to the engineering community. Maybe you would like to see software reviews for commercial or open-source software - please let me know and we’ll make it happen! Submit any suggestions as comments below.
Tags: chemical mechanisms, combustion, computer modeling, computer simulation, diesel, Dr. Bill Pitz, engineering modeling, gasoline, hydrocarbons, KIVA, Lawrence Livermore National Labaratory, LLNL
Hi Masha,
This interview is coherent and impressive managed. Thanks for sharing it.
Be it design, debug or reliability testing. Computer modeling and simulation tools are very important to me as an Electronics engineer. I have interests in the Computational Fluid Dynamic.
I have been trying to understand effects of nozzle design and orientation with respect to a set of disks in a simple tesla turbine, on total electrical power output from the turbine.
Do you think, you can help?
Thanks in advance.
regards
DC
Dear Deepak,
Thanks for your compliment. Glad you and other readers are enjoying these interviews. As far as your CFD question - of course I can help. Feel free to e-mail me directly at masha@mvpmodelingsolutions.com
and we can talk more about your CFD modeling project.
Thanks again for reading,
Masha
Masha,
If I am not sure if a particular combustion equation is valid for a particular (P,V) condition, are there labs that provide testing that as a service?
regards,
LA