Professor
Aerospace Engineering and Mechanics, Center for Advanced Vehicle Technologies
240 Hardaway Hall
(205) 348-4003
(205) 348-7240
Send Email
News Articles
Dr. Semih Olcmen received his undergraduate and master’s degrees from Istanbul Technical University and his doctorate from Virginia Tech. He also holds a post-grad diploma from Von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics in Belgium.
Olcmen is a fluid mechanics expert specializing in laser-based measurement techniques. He has designed numerous laser-doppler velocimetry, or LDV, probes for different applications. He holds a patent for Spark-Plug LDV, LIF, and LII Probe for Engine Flow and Combustion Analysis. He worked at Wright-Patterson Air Force base for seven summers and designed an LDV probe to measure shock-wave/boundary-layer interaction among other research. He has additionally published papers in computational-fluid dynamics.
He has conducted research including the understanding of the nature of 3-D turbulent boundary layers, shock-wave/boundary-layer interaction, weapons-bay flow field, and flow over turrets. His interests include air-breathing propulsion, space propulsion, flow instrumentation, penetration mechanics, and computational fluid dynamics.
Olcmen has graduated 33 master’s and doctoral students and published more than 90 journal and conference publications.