Engineering

Lynch awarded Office of Naval Research Young Investigator's Grant

Stephen Lynch, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, was awarded a three-year grant through the Office of Naval Research (ONR) Young Investigator Program (YIP).

The ONR YIP is one of the oldest and most selective scientific research advancement programs in the country. It supports the professional development of outstanding early-career faculty in research and teaching.

The grant will allow Lynch to investigate the unsteady flow and heat transfer that takes place at the base of a protrusion. The proposed research will lead to improving underwater stealth capability, increasing fuel efficiency for Navy aircraft and enhancing the performance of heat exchangers on Navy ships.

"Dr. Stephen Lynch is studying the interaction of flow with solid protrusions or with other flows that give rise to very complex secondary flow structures, which may be highly unsteady and turbulent. A better understanding of this class of flows -- either in liquids or in gases -- has wide applicability in the Navy, ranging from flows of water around surfaces underwater to cooling of jet engine turbine blades,” said Larry Schuette, director of research for ONR.

“This grant provides my group with a way to make a meaningful impact in an area of fluid dynamics and convective heat transfer that is important to a wide range of Navy applications, and enables me to train the next generation of researchers in the use of advanced fluid diagnostic tools,” Lynch said.

Lynch has been an assistant professor at Penn State since 2013. He directs the Experimental and Computational Convection Lab, which is part of the Turbine Heat Transfer and Aerodynamics Group. Lynch received his bachelor’s degree from the University of Wyoming and his masters and doctorate degrees from Virginia Tech. Prior to coming to Penn State, he was a senior research engineer at United Technologies Research Center.

Stephen Lynch (left) works with a graduate student in the ExCCL lab. Credit: Penn StateCreative Commons

Last Updated May 11, 2015