  The Benchmarck on the Aerodynamics of a Rectangular 5:1 Cylinder is studied
using a data-driven technique which bridges numerical simulation and available
experimental results. Because of intrinsic features of the tools used for
investigation, in particular in terms of set-up and boundary conditions,
significant discrepancies have been observed in the literature when comparing
experimental and numerical results. An approach based on the Ensemble Kalman
Filter (EnKF) is here used to optimize a synthetic turbulent inlet used as
boundary condition in the numerical calculation, in order to reduce the
discrepancy with the available experiments. The data-driven method successfully
optimizes the boundary condition features, which produce a significant
improvement of the accuracy in the prediction of the flow. These finding open
perspectives of application towards the analysis of realistic cases, where
boundary conditions are complex and usually unknown.

Fluid Dynamics