The vast majority of the World's energy sources are fuels, such as oil, coal or natural gas, whose chemical energy is converted into heat through the process of combustion. Heat can then be used in thermodynamic cycles to generate electrical energy or thrust in aircraft or rockets. Learning about the different forms of combustion, how and how fast a fuel reacts and the way a flame or a detonation propagates is the stepping stone towards the efficient design of combustion chambers.

The course will be divided into three main parts: 1) Thermodynamics 2) Chemical Kinetics 3) Reacting flows. Part 1 will be dedicated to the study of equilibrium states, achieved asymptotically at long times. In part 2 we introduce time as an independent variable to study non-equilibrium chemical kinetic spatially-homogeneous processes and their temporal evolution. Finally, in part 3, we introduce space coordinates and derive the conservation equations for a combustible mixture. We will learn about combustion waves in premixed combustion and diffusive flames in non-premixed combustion.