Train Aerodynamics: Fundamentals and Applications

Professor Chris Baker graduated from his doctoral studies at the University of Cambridge, before beginning a Research Fellowship there at St Catharine’s College and the Department of Engineering. In the early 1980s he worked in the Aerodynamics Unit of British Rail Research in Derby, before moving to an academic position in the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Nottingham. He remained there till 1998 where he was a lecturer, reader and professor with research interests in vehicle aerodynamics, wind engineering, environmental fluid mechanics and agricultural aerodynamics. In 1998 he moved to the University of Birmingham as Professor of Environmental Fluid Mechanics in the School of Civil Engineering. In the early years of the present century he was Director of Teaching in the newly formed School of Engineering and Deputy Head of School. From 2003 to 2008 he was Head of Civil Engineering and in 2008 served for a short time as Acting Head of the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences. He was the Director of the Birmingham Centre for Railway Research and Education 2005-2014. He undertook a 30% secondment to the Transport Systems Catapult Centre in Milton Keynes, as Science Director from 2014 to 2016. He retired at the end of 2017 and took up an Emeritus position.

After obtaining an MSc in Industrial Applied Mathematics in 1974, Terry Johnson initially worked as a research assistant at Sheffield Polytechnic. In 1977 he began his railway aerodynamics career as a graduate entrant to the Aerodynamics Team of British Rail Research in Derby. By the time of railway privatisation in 1996, he had risen to be Head of the Team. There followed 12 years working in the railway consultancies of AEA Technology Rail/DeltaRail. He then joined the Railway Safety and Standards Board in 2008 as their Principal Aerodynamics Engineer, and has worked on a wide range of railway aerodynamics research projects and has maintained and developed aerodynamic aspects in GB railway standards. He is a Chartered Mathematician and Fellow of the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications.

Dominic Flynn is a lecturer in Mechanical Engineering at Birmingham City University, with a specialism in computational fluid dynamics (CFD). His PhD thesis investigated the influence of crosswinds on freight train slipstreams and the resulting passenger safety issues. Dominic has worked on both academic research, and industrial, projects using numerical analysis methods and continues to research vehicle aerodynamic phenomena.

Dr Hassan Hemida has more than twenty years of experience in both academia and industry, running research projects that involve steady and unsteady simulations of single and multiphase flows. He obtained his PhD in Trains Aerodynamics from Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden and then worked in Epsilon Sweden for two years before moving to an academic position at Civil Engineering, University of Birmingham. Dr Hemida has led many research projects related to train aerodynamics, looking at slipstream, trains in tunnels, side-wind forces and shape optimisations. Although has focused much of his work on the aerodynamics of ground vehicles (trains, buses and road vehicles), he has conducted other successful projects that involve multiphase flow, heat transfer, combustion, mass transfer and shape optimization. His work is sponsored by RRUK, EPSRC, EU commission and industry including Network Rail, Scania and Bombardier.

Dr Andrew Quinn is a Senior Lecturer and previously RCUK Research Fellow in Civil Engineering and Environmental Science. His research focuses on the interactions between infrastructure, particularly transport systems, renewable energy and extreme weather events/climate change and how these impact on the resilience of communities and services. Prior to this appointment he was part of the internationally recognised Wind Engineering group at the former BBSRC Silsoe Research Institute. He has been investigator on projects for EPSRC, BBSRC, NERC, DEFRA , EU and industry funded work for many organisations including the UK Met Office and Network Rail. This work has included complex full-scale measurement campaigns supporting high profile projects such as the main Olympic stadium in Stratford, mathematical modelling, and statistical treatments to combine observations and modelling in risk analysis.