Software

• NVIDIA maintains a CFD resource page on their website with many technical reports and code samples about GPU-accelerated CFD.
• The former Belmont Technology is now Onshape, “a venture-funded startup founded by members of the original SolidWorks team plus top engineers from the CAD, data center, mobile and streaming media industries.” [Draw your own conclusions about what their products will be like.]
• CD-adapco and SpaceClaim announced STAR-SpaceClaim, a module for SpaceClaim Engineer that provides 3D model transfer to STAR-CCM+ in a manner that eliminates the need for geometry clean-up.
• I think we could all use a gentle introduction to parallel programming with MPI.
• CEI released EnSight 10.0.3g, a maintenance release.

Jobs

I can only assume this surge in CFD-related job postings is good news.

• TotalSim has job openings for those seeking a career in CFD.
• CFD Team Lead in Dearborn, MI
• Onshape is hiring people who know CAD, CAM, PDM, PLM, CAE, MATLAB, Android, iOS, JavaScript, C++ or Java.
• You could be a Junior Aerodynamicist (CFD) at Wirth Research.
• A growing company in Germany seeks a General Manager (CAD, CFD, Mechanical Analysis Software).
• Honeywell in Tulsa, Oklahoma wants to hire a Research & Development Engineer – CFD.
• Pointwise is now accepting resumes for summer 2014 internships on both our technical support and product development teams.

Applications

I don’t remember where I saw this first, but it’s a racing bike paint job that mimics FEA results on the structure. Click the image to link to its source.

• I would really like to see some applied CFD results for Pterosaur aerodynamics.
• COMSOL demonstrates how to parameterize dumb CAD geometry for analysis.
• Siemens PLM Software shares the story of how NX CAE cut preprocessing time in half.
• Words to live by in the new year: Symscape’s 12 CFD tips.
• The latest installment of CFD 1010 from Flow Science is an illustration of numerical instability.

Awards

• Mentor Graphics FloTHERM XT was included in a list of Hot 100 Products of the Year and also recognized as China Innovation Best Product.
• MSC Nastran Embedded Fatigue was awarded CAE Innovation of the Year.
• PTC announced the winners of their 2013 PTC Creo Holiday Season Design Contest.

One of the 3 winning entries from PTC’s holiday design contest. Design by Vladimir Palffy. Image from ptc.com.

Flight of the Bumblebee

Due to their relatively small size, micro air vehicles (what the mainstream media would probably call span-challenged drones) suffer from a lack of controllability in unsteady flowfields. In order to come up with ideas for improving this situation, researchers at Harvard put bumblebees in a wind tunnel in the wake of a circular cylinder and observed how they manage to fly in a relatively unperturbed manner. You’ll have to click through to see the video and find out what they learned. See the article and video at BBC News. See the research paper at the Journal of Experimental Biology.

Photo of a bee in a wind tunnel. Image from BBC News.

Bonus: Even though it looks like what happens when I try to make RoTel (R) cheese dip, watch how this block of Velveeta (R) cheese gives a red hot nickle ball a hard time. I declare cheese to be the winner but wonder if this is the best use for the cheese product given the current shortage. But apparently there is no shortage of hot balls of nickle.