Experimental Study of the Flow Field around a Circular Cylinder Using Plasma Actuators

In this paper different configurations of plasma actuator for controlling the flow around a circular cylinder made of Quartz were experimentally investigated. Three thin plasma actuator electrodes were flush-mounted on the surface of the cylinder and were connected to a DC high voltage power supply for generation of electrical discharge. Different configurations of plasma actuator were used for this study and pressure distribution experiments showed that the existence of the plasma decreases the pressure coefficient of the cylinder and the variation of the pressure coefficient can change the behavior of the lift and drag coefficient of the cylinder for all configurations. According to the pressure distribution data, two configurations of the plasma actuators made the best influence on the aerodynamic performance and also on the drag reduction.