EAGER: Integration of Heat Pipes in Gas Turbines using Artificial Intelligence and Additive Manufacturing

燃气轮机为几乎所有的现代飞机提供动力，美国使用的21%的电力来自天然气。然而，涡轮机效率和可靠性的主要损失是由涡轮机产生的大量多余热量造成的。目前的空气冷却技术在去除这些多余热量方面收效甚微。该项目使用了一种称为热管的先进冷却技术，它可以比空气冷却消耗更多的热量。使用这项技术将显著提高燃气轮机的燃油消耗、效率和可靠性，从而显著节省成本。该项目包括将叶片或叶片内部构造为热管并将其延伸到相邻的散热器，从而将入射热量通过热管传递到散热器。由于热管工作流体的内部相位变化，这种设计提供了极高的传热率和沿叶片的均匀温度。此外，该技术消除了叶片前后边缘的热点，并通过防止热疲劳开裂来延长叶片寿命。还有一种可能是要求压缩机不引气，从而消除因压缩机排气分流而造成的发动机性能损失。结合空气冷却与径向旋转热管也被认为是一种更好的冷却方法。提出的热管是一种创新的冷却系统，包括非传统的几何形状，蒸发，冷凝，蒸汽流动和液体/蒸汽的相互作用。在高离心力和高加速度作用下，金属液态工质的传热和两相流动的复杂传递过程是耦合的。利用人工智能和增材制造技术对燃气轮机热管叶片进行了详细的设计分析。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Gas turbines power almost all modern aircraft and generate about 21% of the electricity used in the United States from natural gas. However, major losses of efficiency and reliability in turbines are caused by the tremendous amount of excess heat that turbines create. Current air-cooling technology has limited success in getting rid of this excess heat. This project uses an advanced cooling technology called heat pipes, which can dissipate significantly greater amounts of heat than air cooling. Using this technology will significantly improve fuel consumption, efficiency and reliability of gas turbines resulting in significant cost savings. The project involves constructing the vane or blade interior as a heat pipe and extending it into an adjacent heat sink, thus transferring incident heat through the heat pipe to the heat sink. This design provides an extremely high heat transfer rate and a uniform temperature along the vane due to the internal changes of the phase of the heat pipe working fluid. Furthermore, this technology eliminates hot spots at the vane leading and trailing edges and increases the vane life by preventing thermal fatigue cracking. There is also the possibility of requiring no bleed air from the compressor, eliminating engine performance losses resulting from the diversion of compressor discharge air. Combined air cooling with radially rotating heat pipes is also considered for a better cooling method. The proposed heat pipe is an innovative cooling system that includes non-conventional geometries, evaporation, condensation, vapor flow, and interaction of the liquid/vapor. These complex transport processes of heat transfer and two-phase flow of a liquid metal working fluid under high centrifugal forces and accelerations are all coupled. A detailed design analysis of integrated gas turbine heat pipe vanes and blades is made using artificial intelligence and additive manufacturing.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.