Celebrating the physics of all that flows with Nicole Sharp, Ph.D.
- Profile
Predicting Meteotsunamis
Meteotsunamis, or meteorological tsunamis, are large waves driven by weather rather than seismic energy. Although they occur along shorelines throughout the world, forecasters have very little infrastructure in place to predict or detect them. But a new study of an April 2018 meteotsunami on Lake Michigan (pictured above) has provided evidence that existing models may…
“Le Temps et l’Espace”
Filmmaker Thomas Blanchard creates a slow and dreamy fluid landscape in “Le Temps et l’Espace”. Made with ink and paints, the visuals are beautiful and serene. For similar works, be sure to check out the “fluids as art” tag! (Image and video credit: T. Blanchard)
Snail Locomotion
Snails and other gastropods move using their single muscular foot and a viscoelastic fluid they secrete. Muscular waves in the foot run from tail to head and are transmitted to the ground through the thin, sticky mucus layer without the snail ever fully detaching from the surface. The characteristics of this mucus layer are critical…
Jovian Auroras
Like Earth, Jupiter is home to polar auroras that light the sky as charged particles interact with the planet’s magnetosphere. A recent paper identifies interesting features in the aurora that appear similar to expanding vortex rings (see inset below). Although the researchers cannot yet identify the origin of the rings, they hypothesize that the process…
Inside the Blockage of the Suez Canal
In March 2021, the world watched as the Ever Given container ship got stuck in the Suez Canal, disrupting global shipping for more than a week. In this Practical Engineering video, Grady delves into some of the phenomena that may have played a role in the incident of the ship that launched a thousand memes.…
Flying Spiders Use Electric Fields
Many species of spider fly with a technique calling ballooning. We’ve touched on spider flight before, but more recent research adds a new dimension to the phenomenon. Researchers showed that spiders can actually use electrical fields in their flight. When isolated from flow or outside electrical fields, researchers found that spiders would still begin ballooning…
“The Golden Sutra”
“The Golden Sutra” is an homage to the colors of Buddhism, specifically the Longzangjing scripture illustrated in yellow, red, green, blue, and white with letters of gold. Artist Roman De Giuli captures some incredible fluid eddies and streaks with ink, paint, and glitter on paper. (Image and video credit: R. De Giuli)
Seeing Through
Often researchers are interested in flows around and between objects, but seeing those flows is a challenge in a crowded field of view. One useful trick for this problem is matching the refractive index of your objects and the fluid they’re immersed in. Here we see the glass beads in a container seemingly disappear when…
Airborne Aerosol Transmission of COVID-19
Early in the COVID-19 pandemic health officials resisted the idea that the novel coronavirus was transmissible through tiny aerosol droplets rather than larger, non-buoyant droplets. One case that made headlines and helped shift opinion was that of an outbreak among patrons of a Guangzhou restaurant traced to a single, pre-symptomatic patient zero. The pattern of…
Reader Question: Kinetic Sand
An inquiring reader wants to know: How does kinetic sand work to make it flow like a liquid? Thanks! – 3 Year Olds Everywhere I confess I don’t have any firsthand experience with Kinetic Sand, but it certainly looks fun. It’s a colorful, moldable sand toy that holds together far better than your typical pile…