Walking on air

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A breakthrough in 3D CFD visualisation allows engineers to see in real-time complex graphical displays, such as airflow around cities and shockwaves forming on aircraft.

Working in 3D is increasingly becoming a standard practice for engineers and designers, with more complex computational fluid dynamics (CFD) systems capable of simulating and analysing ever-larger amounts of data.

But the sheer quantity of the data is creating two problems — how to manipulate it so that users can extract the relevant information; and how to display it meaningfully.

Cambridge Flow Solutions (CFS), a spin-out from Cambridge University’s CFD Laboratory, is working on these problems, and has linked up with 3D specialist Virtalis to make the link to 3D visualisation.

CFS was formed in 1999, but its technologies have been in development since 1985, taking shape from software to simulate the flow of gases through and over turbine blades. Over this time, it has seen CFD develop from a highly-specialised process, accessible only to institutions with supercomputer-level processing power, to a tool that virtually any engineer can access.

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