Academic Credentials
  • Ph.D., Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, University of Virginia, 2020
  • M.Eng., Aeronautical Engineering, Imperial College London, UK, 2015
Licenses & Certifications
  • 40-Hour Hazardous Waste Operation and Emergency Response Certification (HAZWOPER)
  • Blasting Certificate of Competency (MA)
Academic Appointments
  • Research Fellow, Department of Aerospace Engineering, University of Michigan, August 2022 to November 2024
  • Research Fellow, Institute for Combustion Technology, German Aerospace Institute (DLR), July 2020 to July 2022
Professional Honors
  • Schmidt AI in Science Postdoctoral Fellowship Program, a Schmidt Futures Program
Professional Affiliations
  • American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Member
  • National Association of Fire Investigators (NAFI), Member
Languages
  • German

Dr. Rauch has a background in combustion and fluid dynamics and specializes in thermal and fluid flow systems. He has broad expertise in reacting flows, thermodynamics, heat and mass transfer, and fluid dynamics.

At Exponent, Dr. Rauch has supported clients in the legal, insurance, medical device, and gas appliances industries across a range of matters. He has conducted fire and explosion investigations at residential, commercial, and industrial facilities and is a provisional Certified Fire and Explosion Investigator (p-CFEI). Dr. Rauch has experience investigating commercial and residential CO exposure incidents as they relate to gas fired systems (natural gas and propane) such as boilers and water heaters. He has evaluated commercial and consumer product applications for fire and explosion hazards, risks and safety concerns, and standard and regulatory requirements.

Dr. Rauch has broad experience in laboratory testing of gas fired appliances, including residential boiler systems, combustibility and explosibility of dust, and battery thermal runaway. He has also performed computational studies using the commercial Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software Star-CCM+ for medical device and litigation applications.

Prior to joining Exponent, Dr. Rauch has designed and analyzed combustion devices using computational simulations for both power-generation and propulsion applications. This included hydrogen-fueled gas turbines for greenhouse gas emission free power generation while a researcher at the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and hypersonic, air-breathing aircraft propulsion engines while at the University of Michigan as a postdoctoral researcher and while at the University of Virginia during his Ph.D. These simulations included multi-physics effects such as heat transfer, turbulence, combustion, fuel injection, and flow compressibility. This design work included close coordination with partners for experimental validation and design optimization.

Dr. Rauch's academic work focused on the computational simulation and analysis of turbulent and reacting flows including the development of novel numerical methods to enable high-fidelity simulations of lab-scale power-generation and propulsion devices. Additionally, he has experience in machine learning (ML) models for accelerating simulations with data-driven physics-informed approaches.