While vacuums can do pretty wild things to liquids, the title of this Slow Mo Guys video is a bit misleading. They’re not so much exploding gold in a vacuum Keep reading
Tag: recirculation
Spinning Tops
What does the flow look like around a spinning top? Here, researchers used dye to visualize what happens in a Newtonian fluid (like air or water) as well as a Keep reading
Tea Physics
Tea is a popular beverage around the world, and nearly everyone has their own method for making the perfect cup. Perhaps unsurprisingly, scientists have studied tea physics as well. One Keep reading
Resisting Coalescence
When a droplet falls on a pool, we expect it to coalesce. There are exceptions, like bouncing droplets, but in general a droplet only sticks around for a split second Keep reading
Flow Around a Cylinder
A cylinder standing upright in a flow creates a complicated system of vortices and recirculation. In the photo above, the flow is left to right. The cylinder itself is somewhat Keep reading
Oil Flow Viz
Fluorescent oil sprayed onto a model in the NASA Langley 14 by 22-Foot Subsonic Wind Tunnel glows under ultraviolet light. Airflow over the model pulls the initially even coat of Keep reading
Contaminants Flowing Uphill
Here’s an example of some baffling fluid dynamics. Researchers have found that, when pouring a fluid from one container into a lower one containing a fluid with floating particulates, it’s Keep reading
Reader Question: Dry Rear Windshields in the Rain
Reader sheepnamedpig asks: I was driving through the rain down the highway when I noticed something strange: though the rain was heavy enough to reduce visibility to a quarter mile, Keep reading
The Backward-Facing Step
This photo collage shows vortices shed off a backward-facing step. The flow is left to right. Here the flow is visualized using dye released in water. Initially, the vortex forms Keep reading
Stalling a Wing
At small angles of attack, air flows smoothly around an airfoil, providing lifting force through the difference in pressure across the top and bottom of the airfoil. As the angle Keep reading