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Fluid dynamics
Bristol's mathematics department has a long and illustrious history in fluid dynamics, starting in the 1940s when the group was established by Prof. Leslie Howarth, famous for research into the mathematics of supersonic flight such as boundary layer and compressible flow equations, as well as the theory of turbulence.
Building on that foundation, the fluids group boasts 11 full-time faculty members, plus several post-doctoral fellows, researching the nonlinear dynamical equations behind diverse phenomena such as drops, vortices, transition to turbulence, particle-laden and granular flows.
Applications of fluid dynamics
Practical applications of fluid dynamics range from inkjet printers to bulk transportation of fluids, from the survivability of oil rigs at sea to avalanche protection schemes.
Fluid dynamics describes a tremendous variety of fluid phenomena from large scale, such as weather systems, to very small scale, for example microdroplets used in industrial coatings.
Bristol has always maintained the important connection between theory and experiment – it is one of the few mathematics departments that has its own Experimental Laboratory and has encouraged close collaboration with other departments, such as aerospace, civil engineering, physics and earth sciences.
Waves
Vortices
Granular Flows
Non-Newtonian fluids
Turbulence
Contact lines, drops
Recent publications
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Exact coherent structures in pipe: travelling wave solutions (2004)
Wedin, H. & Kerswell, R.R.
J. Fluid Mech., vol: 508, Pages: 333 - 371 -
Applied physics - Designing optimal micromixers (2004)
J. M. Ottino, S. Wiggins
Science, vol: 305, Issue: 5683, Pages: 485 - 486
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