Heat transfer characteristics of plasma actuation in different boundary-layer flows

Abstract

The coupling characteristics of the aerodynamic and thermal effects of a surface dielectric barrier discharge plasma actuator and its transfer characteristics in different boundary-layer flows are studied experimentally. The actuator is attached to the surface of a flat-plate airfoil and driving by an alternative-current signal. Different boundary-layer flows are achieved in the wind tunnel by adjusting the airfoil's angle of attack with a Reynolds number of 2.02 × 105. The spatial temperature-rise distributions and velocity fields induced by plasma actuation in quiescent air show that the influence range of temperature is consistent with that of the induced velocity field. The aerodynamic and thermal effects induced by plasma actuation have strong coupling characteristics. The heat around the actuator is limited within the boundary-layer flows with a 15 m/s incoming flow. The temperature rise outside the boundary layer is close to zero. In the turbulent boundary-layer flow, the temperature is lower than that in the laminar boundary-layer flow as a whole. The maximum temperature-rise difference exceeds 10 °C. In the leading-edge separation-bubble flow, most heat generated by the plasma actuation is restricted inside the separation bubble. The results provide references for the mechanism detection of related plasma icing-control and flow-control research.