Assessment of RANS Turbulence Models for Swept Shock Wave–Boundary Layer Interactions
Andrea PALUMBO, Sergio PIROZZOLI
Abstract. In this work, we carry out Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) simulations of the three-dimensional interaction between an oblique shock wave and a supersonic turbulent boundary layer. The analysis focuses on the canonical case of three-dimensional interaction with cylindrical symmetry, obtained by adding a crossflow velocity component to the incoming boundary layer, resulting in a two-dimensional, three-component (2D/3C) flow. In the RANS framework, the 2D/3C flow assumption leads to a simplified set of equations, which can be efficiently solved in a two-dimensional domain. The RANS results are compared with previous high-fidelity data-sets in the same flow conditions for two values of the sweep angle. It is shown that the RANS approach is able to predict the increased size of the interaction region for the swept case, in agreement with previous literature findings. However, we observe noticeable differences between RANS and DNS in the streamwise distributions of wall quantities.
Keywords
Computational Fluid Dynamics, Supersonic/Hypersonic Flows, Shock Wave-Boundary Layer Interaction, Turbulence Modelling
Published online 7/20/2026, 6 pages
Copyright © 2026 by the author(s)
Published under license by Materials Research Forum LLC., Millersville PA, USA
Citation: Andrea PALUMBO, Sergio PIROZZOLI, Assessment of RANS Turbulence Models for Swept Shock Wave–Boundary Layer Interactions, Materials Research Proceedings, Vol. 69, pp 205-210, 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.21741/9781644904251-36
The article was published as article 36 of the book CEAS – AIDAA Conference 2025
Content from this work may be used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license. Any further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and DOI.
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