Analysis of Shock Buffeting Over Airfoils in Transonic Flows

Aircraft at certain Mach numbers and angles of attack are known to be susceptible to an aerodynamic phenomenon known as buffeting, which involves periodic variations of the aerodynamic load that result in a narrowing of the safe flight envelope. Buffet onset has been linked in the literature to global aerodynamic mode instability, which is related to the oscillation of the shock location. However, a satisfactory understanding of the mechanism is yet to be found in the literature. In this work, we aim for a characterization of such physical mechanisms based on the result of high-resolution wall-resolved Large Eddy Simulation using sixth-order shock-capturing compact finite difference methods. This is conducted via detailed analysis of the shock-boundary layer interaction through the application of physics-aware data-driven approaches. Ultimately, such analysis may inform the development of improved models that predict both the onset and subsequent dynamics of the shock oscillation.