Amanda Smyth MEng PhD

Amanda Smyth studied for her MEng in Mechanical Engineering at Imperial College London from 2011 to 2015. She completed her PhD while at Murray Edwards College, Cambridge, from 2015 to 2019, working in the Whittle Laboratory in the Cambridge University Engineering Department. The PhD title was "Three-Dimensional Unsteady Hydrodynamics of Tidal Turbines", and Amanda was awarded the Helios prize for best graduate paper on renewable energy and energy efficiency, for work arising from her thesis.

During 2019-2020 Amanda worked as a research associate in the Whittle Laboratory under an EPSRC Doctoral Fellowship Award, a stipendiary research fellowship intended to increase the impact of her PhD outcomes.

In October 2020 she started a Career Development Fellowship at St Hugh's College, and was appointed to the Faculty of Engineering Science.

Amanda's research area is in unsteady fluid dynamics, with a particular focus on 3D effects. Her work has explored the limitations of 2D strip-theory approaches to wing and rotor modelling, in particular when applied to tidal turbine blades, which are highly three-dimensional in shape. She is also working on mitigation strategies to minimise unsteady hydrodynamic loading on tidal turbines, identifying passive design parameters for the turbine blades to reduce the risk of premature fatigue failures or catastrophic overloading.

In addition to her work on tidal turbines, using her background in unsteady fluid dynamics for 3D flows, Amanda works on exploring the limits of applicability of 2D analytic models of unsteady gust-aerofoil interaction, and also studies the high-efficiency propulsive swimming motions of marine animals.

Amanda primarily uses a combination of high- and low-order numerical simulation to carry out her research, as well as analytical modelling. The work is carried out in collaboration with researchers at the universities of Edinburgh, Bath and Cambridge.

Corrective functions for 3D effects in unsteady aerodynamic loading: This project aims to develop a physics-based analytical correction to 2D strip-theory solvers, such that they can account for unsteady 3D effects.

Minimising unsteady hydrodynamic loads on tidal turbines through passive blade design: A parametric study of turbine design, using low-order modelling, to establish design guidance for reducing turbulence- and wave-induced unsteady loading.

High-efficiency swimming motion in marine animals: This project uses eigenmode analysis to examine features of optimal swimming motion in various marine creatures, such as eels, flatworms and manta rays.

Rotor wake instability in unsteady inflow conditions: An investigation into features of wake instability occurring in helical rotor wakes when there is unsteady inflow, using high-order simulations (URANS).

Journal publications:

• Smyth, A. S. M., Young, A. M., Di Mare, L., "The Effect of 3D Geometry on Harmonic Gust-aerofoil Interaction", special edition of the AIAA Journal: Unsteady Aerodynamic Response of Rigid Wings in Large-Amplitude Gust Encounters, 2021.
• Young, A. M., Smyth, A. S. M., "Gust-aerofoil Coupling with a Loaded Aerofoil", special edition of the AIAA Journal: Unsteady Aerodynamic Response of Rigid Wings in Large-Amplitude Gust Encounters, 2021.

Conference papers:

• Young, A. M., Smyth, A. S. M., "The Interaction of a Sears-type Sinusoidal Gust With a Cambered Aerofoil in the Presence of Non-uniform Streamwise Flow", AIAA SciTech conference, January 2020. https://doi.org/10.2514/6.2020-0558
• Smyth, A. S. M., Young, A. M., "Three-Dimensional Unsteady Hydrodynamic Modelling of Tidal Turbines", European Wave and Tidal Energy Conference (EWTEC), September 2019. https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.40077
• Young, A. M., Smyth, A. S. M., Bajpai, V., Augarde, R. F., Farman, J. R., Sequeira, C. L., "Improving Tidal Turbine Efficiency Using Winglets", European Wave and Tidal Energy Conference (EWTEC), September 2019.
• Smyth, A. S. M., Young, A. M., Di Mare, L., "The Effect of 3D Geometry on Unsteady Gust Response, Using a Vortex Lattice Model", AIAA SciTech conference, January 2019. https://doi.org/10.2514/6.2019-0899

Recorded talks

• "Tidal Turbines: Unsteady hydrodynamics in 3D" available on the UK Fluids Network website: https://fluids.ac.uk/talks/1409