Cantera is a suite of object-oriented software tools for problems involving chemical kinetics, thermodynamics, and/or transport processes.

With Cantera's object technology, you assemble your architectural masterpiece (i.e application program) from a set of very special bricks you pick up at the Cantera quarry! Each "brick" (or object) represents some well-defined small component of the global structure.

Cantera 2.0 is now in beta. It includes a new build system based on scons, a python build environment, with an alternative autotool system. Cantera includes several new thermodynamics and transport classes, including a large database of aqueous thermodynamics. It may be downloaded as the trunk version of cantera. Documentation for Cantera 2.0 is available at the following link.

http://cantera.github.com/docs/sphinx/html/index.html

Some of the types (or classes) of objects Cantera provides represent

• phases of matter
• interfaces between these phases
• reaction managers
• time-dependent or steady reactor networks
• IC engine models
• CSTR reactor network
• One-dimensional flows
• Burner-stabilized flat flames
• Air plasma formed behind the bow shock on a re-entry vehicle during re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere
• Adiabatic propagating flat flames

Some of the areas where Cantera is used currently:

• Combustion
• Flames Structure
• Detonations
• Electrochemical Energy Conversion and Storage
• Fuel Cells
• Batteries

• Aqueous electrolytes
• Thermodynamics of brines
• Electrode reactions in aqueous environments

• Plasmas
• Atmospheric-pressure thermal plasmas
• Low-Pressure DC, RF, and Microwave Plasmas
• Laser-Created

• Thin Film Deposition
• Chemical Vapor Deposition