Approximately 66 million years ago, a 10-km asteroid struck our planet near Chicxulub on the Yucatán Peninsula. The impact was globally catastrophic, causing tsunamis, wildfires, earthquakes, and so much atmosphere-clogging Keep reading
Category: Research
Hydrodynamic Spin Lattices
Droplets bouncing on a fluid bath display some strikingly quantum-like behaviors thanks to the interactions between a drop and its guiding surface wave. Here, researchers use submerged wells beneath the Keep reading
Keeping Cool in the Cretaceous
I love that fluid dynamics can bring new insights to other subjects, like this study on how heavily-armored ankylosaurs avoided heat stroke. Scans of ankylosaur skulls show a complicated, twisty Keep reading
Flying Out of the Water
Flying fish and diving birds often navigate the interface between water and air in their flight, but few studies have actually looked at the effects of this transition on lift. Keep reading
Microjets and Needle-Free Injection
Some people don’t mind needles, and others absolutely detest them. But to replace needles with needle-free injections, we have to understand how high-speed microjets pass through skin. Given skin’s opacity, Keep reading
Sea Sponge Hydrodynamics
The Venus’s flower basket is a sea sponge that lives at depths of 100-1000 meters. Its intricate latticework skeleton has long fascinated engineers for its structural mechanics, but a new Keep reading
Leidenfrost Without the Heat
Leidenfrost drops slide almost frictionlessly on a layer of their own vapor, generated by extremely hot surfaces nearby. But in this experiment researchers recreated many of the classic behaviors of Keep reading
The Froghopper’s Incredible Suction
The tiny froghopper feeds on the sap in xylem, a feat that requires overcoming more than a megapascal of negative pressure. Plants, as you may recall, transport water and nutrients Keep reading
Adhering Through Vibration
This little robot relies on vibration to generate its adhesion. By vibrating its flexible disk, it generates low pressure in the thin air layer between the disk and the surface. Keep reading
Programmable Capillary Action
Capillary action combines the cohesive forces within a liquid and the adhesive forces between a liquid and solid to enable a liquid to fill narrow spaces, even against the force Keep reading