Celebrating the physics of all that flows with Nicole Sharp, Ph.D.
- Profile
Soap Film Breakup
This high-speed video shows a soap film formed across two rings and its deformation and breakup as the two rings are pulled apart. As the rings get further apart, surface tension deforms the soap film until the distance is too great to continue sustaining that shape. The film breaks into two–a sheet of soap film…
Colliding Jets
Two jets colliding can form a chain-like fluid structure. With increasing flow rate, the rim of the chains becomes wavy and unstable, forming a fishbone structure where droplets extend outward from the fluid sheet via tiny ligaments. Eventually, the droplets break off in a pattern as beautiful as it is consistent. (Photo credits: A. Hasha…
Examples of Flutter
Aeroelasticity is the study of the interaction of structural and aerodynamic forces on an object, and its most famous example is flutter, which occurs when the aerodynamic forces on an object couple with its natural structural frequencies in such a way that a violent self-excited oscillation builds. What does that mean? Take a look at the…
Vortices on an Airliner
Wingtip vortices form on airplanes due to the finite length of their wings. In general, lift on the wings results from low-pressure, high-velocity air moving over the top of the wing and high-pressure, low-velocity air moving below the wing. Near the wingtips, the high-pressure air is able to slip around the edge to the top…
Cloud Swirls
Two interesting sets of clouds are featured in this satellite photo of the Canary Islands and the coast of Africa. In the upper part of the picture, closed cell stratocumulus clouds cover the ocean. As the wind drives these clouds over the islands, their pattern is disturbed by mountains that force the lower layers of…
Ferrofluid
[original media no longer available] The motion of ferrofluids in magnetic fields is always mesmerizing. Here a ferrofluid has been submerged in a clear alcohol-based solution in a shallow dish while a permanent magnet is used to perturb the liquid. Instead of forming its distinctive spikes due to the normal-field instability, the fluid forms ribbons and…
Flow in Urban Areas
While we typically think about boundary layers as a small region near the surface of an object–be it airplane, golf ball, or engine wall–boundary layers can be enormous, like the planetary boundary layer, the part of the atmosphere directly affected by the earth’s surface. Shown above is a flow visualization of the boundary layer in…
Liquid Nitrogen and the Leidenfrost Effect
One of the tried and true cooking tips my mother gave me when I was younger was to test the temperature of my griddle before making pancakes by splashing a few drops of water on it. If it was hot enough that the water skittered across the surface before evaporating, then it was ready. Aside…
Drops Through Drops
The splashes from droplets impacting jets create truly mesmerizing liquid sculptures. Corrie White is one of the masters of this type of high-speed macro photography. Her work captures the instantaneous battles between viscosity, surface tension, and inertia. The fantastic structure seen here through the falling droplets is created by a series of drops timed so…
Reversing a Flow
The reversibility of laminar mixing often comes as a surprise to observers accustomed to the experience of being unable to separate two fluids after they’ve been combined. As you can see above, however, inserting dye into a highly viscous liquid and then mixing it by turning the inner of two concentric cylinders can be undone…