► Heat Transfer/ Fluid Mechanics Research

ME faculty are engaged in both development and application of Computational Fluid Dynamics methodology in conjunction with the Mississippi State Computational Simulation and Design Center (SimCenter) on campus.

A team of faculty and graduate students is working with heat exchanger industries on both the heat transfer design and the mechanical design and fabrication of Heat Exchangers.  One area of concentration is Heat Transfer Enhancement resulting from surface roughness and modified surface configurations.

Applied Energy Conservation research is conducted by the MSU Industrial Assessment Center (IAC) and the MSU Industrial Assessment Center (IAC) Outreach housed in the Department of Mechanical Engineering.  The MSU IAC, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy, provides energy engineering expertise for Mississippi manufacturers. The MSU IAC Outreach, sponsored by the U.S. Small Business Administration provides energy engineering expertise for Mississippi businesses.

The ME faculty have research projects in the U.S. DOE Cooling, Heating, and Power (CHP) and MicroCHP for Buildings program.  Cooling, Heating, and Power (CHP) is a promising technology for increased energy efficiency through the use of distributed electricity (DE) generation and waste energy recovery systems at or near end-user sites. MicroCHP is small-scale (compact) applications of CHP designed for use in residences or small commercial or agricultural buildings. These projects include Thermal and Fluid Systems Modeling of energy generation and utilization devices in buildings that have locally generated electricity and associated HVAC systems.

Uncertainty Analysis projects by ME faculty include research with NASA to determine the uncertainty in the performance tests on advanced propulsion systems.  The uncertainty methodologies are also being used to determine the uncertainty of comparisons between tests and analytical models and of the total design process including the manufacturing component.