[original media no longer available] This video explores some of the non-Newtonian behaviors of oobleck when shaken. The pattern across the surface once the vibrations start is called Faraday waves, Keep reading
Month: January 2025
Wavy Vortices
Shown above is the flow between two concentric cylinders (Taylor-Couette flow). In the laminar regime, the velocity profile between the two cylinders is linear. As the rate of rotation of Keep reading
Bristling Scales Give Sharks Speed
The shortfin mako shark is one of the ocean’s fastest and most agile hunters, thanks in part to flexible scales along its body. As water flows around the shark’s body, Keep reading
Pterosaur Aerodynamics
The pterosaur was an enormous prehistoric reptile that flew with wings of living membrane stretched over a single long bone, unlike any of today’s flying creatures. New research using carbon Keep reading
Flying Snake Video
A follow-up on the flying snakes. This video shows researchers filming the actual snakes gliding and performing maneuvers. See also the Scientific American article on their work. #
Superfluid Dripping
This high-speed video shows superfluid helium dripping and breaking up. Although superfluid has no viscosity, this does not prevent the Plateau-Rayleigh instability from breaking the helium into droplets once the Keep reading
Flying Snakes Draft off Themselves
Some snakes in Southeast and South Asia are known to glide some 100 m between trees. Researchers filmed snakes, constructed computational models of their flights, and tested plastic models in Keep reading
Calcium Plasma on the Sun
This high-resolution photo of our sun shows the structure of calcium plasma on the surface of the sun. Plasmas are governed by the same physics as our familiar earthbound fluids Keep reading
Oil Chandeliers
What you see above is a composite of images of an oil droplet falling into alcohol from two different heights. The top row of images is from a height of Keep reading
Swimming in Corn Syrup
Highly viscous laminar flows exhibit kinematic reversibility, meaning: if you move the fluid one direction and then execute the same motion in the opposite direction, every fluid particle will return Keep reading