Nowadays high pressure turbulent combustion is a topic of interest for a number of applications, from industrial burner up to diesel and rocket engines. In this context the numerical investigation of high pressure, turbulent and reactive flows by means of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) is an attractive tool both for the design of realistic combustion chambers and characterization of thermal loads, and both from a more fundamental perspective, such as the analysis of mixing dynamics and

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... structures at high pressure. Progressively more reliable and affordable multi-dimensional simulations are nowadays performed, especially prompted by the development of High Performance Computing (HPC) algorithms and infrastructures. However, the realization of such complex simulations is still associated to numerical challenges far from being resolved. Among the many, one is the computational bottleneck associated to boundary layer resolution of high-Reynolds number flows, such as those found in LRE applications. These kind of flows are generally characterized by extreme thermodynamic conditions and substantial variation of properties during nominal operative conditions. In this context an example is given by propellant injection, which generally occurs at high pressure and cryogenic temperatures and is then followed by mixing and combustion processes, or by the regenerative cooling system of a LRE, where the fluid enters the system under cryogenic conditions and is then heated up by the heat flux from the combustion chamber. The mentioned situations induce substantial variation of properties which impacts the near-wall region of a wall-bounded flow, making its numerical modeling even more complex. In this context wall-modeled simulations are conceived in order not to solve the turbulent boundary layer down to the wall. This results in relevant saving in terms of computational power, but requires huge modeling efforts of the wall and of the near-wall field. In this kind of simulations, wall functions are generally employe [...]