Realizing the Vision of CFD in 2030

Abstract

In 2014, NASA released a report outlining a future state for aerospace computational fluid dynamics (CFD), the CFD Vision 2030 Study (the Study).1 Developed by experts from industry, government, and academia, the Study provided a forecast of CFD capabilities required for turbulent, transitional, and reacting flow simulations across a broad Mach number regime. In addition, the Study provided an aspirational role for future CFD as part of a routine, efficient, and physics-based aerospace design and development process. This future role of CFD was summarized in the Study as follows: “A single engineer/scientist must be able to conceive, create, analyze, and interpret a large ensemble of related simulations in a time-critical period (e.g., 24 hours), without individually managing each simulation, to a prespecified level of accuracy.”