TUHH scientist receives Curt Bartsch Award 2023 for best PhD thesis

The most familiar example of trailing vortices can be found in so-called contrails in the sky. On closer inspection, two key points become clear: vortices are incredibly persistent and they tend to exhibit instable behavior, e.g. moving sideways. In the case of such wings, the focus is more on vortex evolution far away in the so-called far field, e.g. considering the question of safe separation distances between aircraft. The situation is different in a naval architecture context, where the focus lies on the region of emergence and shortly downstream, e.g. considering the question of (cavitating) propeller tip vortices or the footprint of vortices in the propeller's wake field.

This is where Dr. Feder's thesis starts. Based on open questions from a large NATO project, his thesis studies the trailing vortices of a drifting ship hull – quasi a wing with an extremely small span – using turbulence-resolving simulations. This revealed similarities and differences to the development of vortices in the far field. These include the occurrence and influence of instabilities and turbulence as well as the development of extreme velocity excess, respectively. The fundamental findings can contribute e.g. to a better understanding of the formation of aft bilge vortices shed from full block ships or propeller tip vortices at the initial stage. The research was supervised by Prof. Dr.-Ing. Moustafa Abdel-Maksoud at the Institute of Fluid Dynamics and Ship Theory at TUHH.