Celebrating the physics of all that flows with Nicole Sharp, Ph.D.
- Profile
“Otherworld, Vol. 1”
Roman De Giuli’s “Otherworld, Volume 1” is a beautiful exploration of color and flow. Glittery particulates act as tracers in the flow, reminiscent of the way rheoscopic fluids do. In many sequences, the glitter lends a sense of texture to the flow. Without context, I cannot say whether those are true flow features, but they…
Holding Fast in the Flow
Many tiny creatures in the natural world face living in fast flows. The larvae of the net-winged midge, for example, forage their way through fast-flowing Alpine springs with speeds of 3 m/s or more. You or I would find standing in such water a challenge, but these larvae are unbothered, thanks to the clever suction-cup-like…
Superwalking Droplets
Vibrate a pool of silicone oil and you can generate walking droplets. Drive the vibration at two simultaneous frequencies and you can support much larger droplets, known as superwalkers. These superwalkers have their own intriguing dynamics, a few of which are featured in this video. Superwalkers can create promenading pairs, chase one another, orbit, and…
Morphing Wings Using Real Feathers
Although humanity has long been inspired by bird flight, most of our flying machines are nothing like birds. Engineers have struggled to recreate the ease with which birds are able to morph their wings’ characteristics as they change from one shape to another. Now researchers have built a biohybrid robot, PigeonBot, that uses actual pigeon…
Breaking the Euler Equations
Mathematicians like to break things. Or, more exactly, they like to know when the equations we use to describe physics break down. One popular target in fluid mechanics are the Euler equations, which describe the motion of frictionless, incompressible flows. Mathematicians have been on the hunt for centuries for situations where these equations predict singularities,…
When the Mediterranean Dried Up
Geological evidence shows that millions of years ago, the Mediterranean Sea nearly dried out. In fluid mechanics, we’d describe this problem using one of our fundamental equations: conservation of mass, also known as continuity. Imagine a volume containing the entire Mediterranean. To describe the amount of sea water in that volume, you need to keep…
Captured by Waves
Acoustic levitation and optical tweezers both use waves — of sound and light, respectively — to trap and control particles. Water waves also have the power to move and capture objects, as shown in this award-winning poster from the 2019 Gallery of Fluid Motion. The central image shows a submerged disk, its position controlled by…
Rattlesnakes Sip Rain From Their Scales
Getting enough water in arid climates can be tough, but Western diamondback rattlesnakes have a secret weapon: their scales. During rain, sleet, and even snow, these rattlesnakes venture out of their dens to catch precipitation on their flattened backs, which they then sip off their scales. Researchers found that impacting water droplets tend to bead…
Bouncing Off Defects
The splash of a drop impacting a surface depends on many factors — among them droplet speed and size, air pressure, and surface characteristics. In this award-winning video from the 2019 Gallery of Fluid Motion, we see how the geometry of a superhydrophobic surface can alter a splash. When a drop falls on a protruding…