Celebrating the physics of all that flows with Nicole Sharp, Ph.D.
- Profile
“Self-pollination in a flower of thymeleaf speedwell (Veronica serpyllifolia)”
Though we rarely notice their movement in the moment, plants, and especially their flowers, are frequently on the move. Here, retired engineer Jay McClellan captures a thymeleaf speedwell flower as it opens, then pushes a stamen toward its pistil, thereby pollinating itself. Like much of the motion executed by plants, these movements come from pumping…
Closing a Venus Fly Trap
The Venus fly trap has long fascinated scientists with its ability to catch fast-moving prey. Just how the plant closes its “trap” leaf so quickly is a matter of debate. A new study gives us more detail–but not complete clarity–about what’s going on. One way that plants move rapidly is by moving water into or…
A Special Trio of Clouds
Off the coast of Alaska, March 19th, 2026 featured a trio of fascinating clouds. Southwest of Anchorage, a cyclonic polar low twisted up from cold polar air centered over warmer waters. This particular storm boasted tropical-storm-force winds and thunderstorms in its center. Further west, long cloud streets formed parallel to the wind as cold dry…
Dropping Oobleck
Oobleck is a peculiar substance. Formed from a suspension of cornstarch particles in water, it can flow like a liquid at low shear rates or jam into a solid under impact. Here, researchers explore what happens to a droplet of oobleck impacting a surface. As they expected, the team found that dilute drops could spread…
The Teton Dam Failure
Engineering failures always leave us with lessons learned. The failure of Teton Dam in 1976 triggered an overhaul in how we manage dam construction and regulation. As Grady describes in this Practical Engineering video, the earthen dam was built with fundamental flaws that allowed water to carve pathways beneath and through the sediment meant to…
Vanishing Spirits: Cognac
Years ago, photographer Ernie Button discovered an intriguing stain left behind in his whiskey glass after the last drops evaporated. That discovery led both to beautiful images and an entire scientific paper analyzing how the alcohol, surfactants, and polymers in the whiskey combined to leave such a uniform stain. Over the years, Button continued investigating…
Oyster Reefs Sequester Nitrogen
The US eastern seaboard was once blanketed with oyster beds, but overharvesting, pollution, and habitat destruction decimated the population. As filter-feeders, oysters are naturally good at cleaning intertidal zones, and the reefs they build by cementing themselves to one another provide valuable habitat for many species of fish. A new study shows that oysters are…
Brushstrokes in Blue
In early February 2026, cold weather swept into southern Florida. The cold fronts churned up sediment and cooled shallow waters, making them denser than the warmer waters of the open ocean. That caused the cooled water to sink off the continental shelf, carrying bright sediment with it. The satellite images of swirling sediment remind me…
Why Unpaved Roads Washboard
As anyone who has regularly traveled unpaved roads knows, they have a tendency to develop regularly spaced corrugations, otherwise known as washboarding. In addition to shaking cars and passengers, these uneven surfaces make cars harder to control, sicne the wheels can lose contact with the ground entirely at times. Unfortunately, this phenomenon is fairly unavoidable.…
Shocked Jets
Breaking a jet of liquid into droplets lies at the heart of many industrial processes: spray painting, fuel injection, and asthma inhalers, to name a few. Here, researchers are looking at a different method of breaking up a liquid jet: shooting a shock wave along its length. The poster shows five different snapshots of the…