TTU Home COE Home Mechanical Engineering Environmental Fluid Mechanics

Environmental/Geophysical Fluid Mechanics (by Dr. Sergey Smirnov)

Environmental/Geophysical Fluid Mechanics (EGFM) is an interdisciplinary science that combines miscellaneous topics from classical fluid mechanics, thermodynamics, hydrology, meteorology, oceanography, etc. It started emerging in the mid 1940s, when people begun interested in modeling complex atmospheric and oceanic flows with simple mathematical tools. Presently EGFM may be considered as a well-developed area of science. However, most of its advances were achieved in terms of physical interpretations, mathematical models and engineering applications. In view of today's concerns regarding global and fast changes in the modern world, there is a strong necessity for synergy among engineering, physical, biological, chemical, and socio-economic sciences. In this regard EGFM is still a young and growing discipline, full of future discoveries. It is probably true, that the unified picture of nature is going to be very complex, but there will always be a desire for simple and clear concepts and models, which serve as guiding principles in our understanding of nature. 

Following is a list of classical textbooks dedicated to the subject of EGFM: 

J. Pedlosky “Geophysical Fluid Dynamics” 2nd Ed. (Springer, 1987)

A.E. Gill “Atmosphere/Ocean Dynamics” (Academic, 1982)

B. Cushman-Roisin “Introduction to Geophysical Fluid Dynamics” (Prentice-Hall, 1994)

G.K. Vallis “Atmospheric and Oceanic Fluid Dynamics” (Cambridge, 2006)

J.C. McWilliams “Fundamentals of Geophysical Fluid Dynamics” (Cambridge, 2006)

S.A. Thorpe “The Turbulent Ocean” (Cambridge, 2005)

A.J. Majda, X. Wang “Non-linear Dynamics and Statistical Theories for Basic Geophysical Flows” (Cambridge, 2006)

R. Salmon “Lectures on Geophysical Fluid Dynamics” (Oxford, 1998)

C.S. Yih “Dynamics of Non-Homogeneous Fluids” (MacMillan, 1965)

H. Greenspan “The Theory of Rotating Fluids” (Cambridge, 1968)

J.S. Turner “Buoyancy Effects in Fluids” (Cambridge, 1973)

J.R. Holton “Introduction to Dynamic Meteorology” 3rd Ed. (Academic, 1992)

M.J. Lighthill “Waves in Fluids” (Cambridge, 1978)

O.M. Phillips “Dynamics of the Upper Ocean” (Cambridge, 1978)

Current Research

 

Wake Flows in Stratified Fluids

Rotating Stratified Spin-Up Flows

Coastal-Trapped Waves

Turbulence in Submarine Canyons

Respiratory Fluid Dynamics