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 Keep reading
Category: Phenomena
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 Keep reading
Superman’s Hair Gel
I love a good tongue-in-cheek physical analysis of superheroes. This estimate of the drag force experienced by Superman’s hair when outracing a plane or speeding bullet was done by Cornell Keep reading
Spinning Ink Out of Markers
I have to say I’m grateful that my classmates in school never discovered the mess-generating superpower of felt-tipped markers. As the Slow Mo Guys demonstrate here, when you spin or Keep reading
Siberia’s Rivers
Each winter the Kolyma River in Siberia freezes to a depth of several meters. But by June the river thaws and discharges its annual 136 cubic kilometers of water into Keep reading
Behind the Bubbly
Carbonation and the fizzy bubbles that come with it are surprisingly popular among humans. Through fermentation or artificial introduction, carbon dioxide gas gets dissolved into a liquid under high pressure. Keep reading
Waltzing Defects
Liquid crystals are a peculiar state of matter with both liquid and crystalline properties. In this video, a microfluidic device breaks water into droplets surrounded by a shell of liquid Keep reading
Inside the Fire Lab
Fire plays an important role in nature, one with which humanity must live without controlling fully. After several disastrous historic wildfires in the American West, the U.S. Forest Service established Keep reading
An Introduction to the Reynolds Number
For those who’d like an overview of the mathematics involved in fluid dynamics, Numberphile has a lovely introduction, given by our friend Tom Crawford. The governing equations in fluid dynamics, Keep reading
Flow on Commercial Wings
Even in an era of supercomputers, there is a place for quick and dirty methods of flow visualization. Here we see a model of a swept wing like those seen on Keep reading