Virginia Tech Center for Research and Engineering in Aero/Hydrodynamic Technologies

The vision of the Center for Research and Engineering in Aero/Hydrodynamics (CREATe) is to exploit the synergy between scientific advances in fluid dynamics and acoustics, and engineering advances in renewable energy. The center was officially chartered by the university as a department level center in February 2014. It brings together 9 core faculty in Aerospace and Ocean Engineering and Mechanical Engineering and 14 affiliate faculty in a range of departments. The Center’s administrative home is in 660 McBryde Hall at Virginia Tech's campus in Blacksburg, VA. Members of the center are engaged in a diverse range of research projects that focus on the fundamentals of fluid dynamics and aeroacoustics and on applied problems within wind energy, propulsion, fluid diagnostics, computational methods, fluid-structure interaction, cavitation, and other topics. Many of these efforts emphasize student-centered research and involve collaborations with other universities and industry, both domestic and international. Many of these efforts involve use of the Virginia Tech Stability Wind Tunnel. The wind tunnel is a major aeroacoustic research facility in the US for flow acoustics and a global leader for the aerodynamic and aero-acoustic testing of wind turbine blade designs. A key theme of the wind tunnel and the center is incorporating state of the art research tools and research problems into the undergraduate curriculum.