MECH5371 - Extreme Applications in Fluid Mechanics

MECH 5371 Extreme Applications in Fluid Mechanics (3 semester credit hours) What causes tornadoes, and what sustains their immensely-destructive evolution? Why do beads of water dance across lotus leaves, and how can some insects defy gravity by walking on water? Turbidity currents are violent soil-water jets that career down the walls of the ocean sea floor: what causes them? After the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, fluid dynamicists were able to accurately estimate the number of barrels of oil per day emanating from the ruptured pipe: how did they do this? Why are wing suits a precarious activity (no instructor demonstrations given). In this class, we will draw upon undergraduate-level mathematics and fluid dynamics to explain the mechanisms responsible for these (and other) extreme fluid flows. (3-0) R