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Research

Environmental Fluid Dynamics

Core research facilities.

Architectural Fluid Mechanics Lab

The Architectural Fluid Mechanics Laboratory specializes in research involving:

  • Buoyancy driven flows
  • Dispersion phenomena
  • Groundwater flows
  • Multiphase flows (CO2 sequestration)
  • Probabilistic risk analysis
  • Sustainable building ventilation
  • Transport in heterogeneous porous media
  • Vortex rings

Coastal Hydraulics Lab

The Coastal Hydraulics laboratory focuses on:

  • Water wave transformation
  • Nearshore morphological development
  • Sensing systems for coastal zones

Computational Hydraulics

The Computational Hydraulics lab develops accurate, efficient, robust and usable high performance computational models of coastal ocean hydrodynamics and transport that can be applied to real engineering problems:

  • Coastal flooding due to hurricanes
  • Currents for shipping operations, dredging, and harbor design
  • Shoreline erosion/accretion and coastal morphology
  • Sewage and waste heat disposal
  • Water resources management – fisheries management

DYNAMO Laboratory

The Structural Dynamics and Monitoring Laboratory is a teaching and research facility dedicated to furthering the understanding of dynamic effects on structures and strategies for their mitigation.

DYNAMO research projects emphasize a multi-disciplinary approach to engineering research and education, synthesizing bench-scale experiments, innovative analysis and simulation techniques, advanced sensor technologies, cyber-infrastructure and full-scale/field study.

Groundwater Hydrology

The Groundwater Hydrology Laboratory is headed by Dr. Stephen E. Silliman.

NatHaz Modeling Lab

The Computational Hydraulics lab quantifies the load effects caused by various natural hazards on structures, developing innovative strategies to mitigate and manage their effects.

The NatHaz Modeling Laboratory is associated with the Department of Civil Engineering and Geological Sciences and is directed by Dr. Ahsan Kareem.

Atmosphere-Ocean Laboratory

The Environmental Fluid Dynamics Atmosphere-Ocean Laboratory deals with computational modeling and field measurements of geophysical flows, especially flows in deep and costal oceans as well as urban atmospheric settings. Of particular interest are the flows in complex terrain, atmospheric boundary layer, upper atmospheric turbulence, dispersion in the environment, internal and surface waves in oceans and oceanic microstructure. The laboratory maintains a suite of equipment for atmospheric and oceanic measurements. These instruments include state-of-the-art remote and in-situ measurement systems several of which were developed in house. The laboratory is heavily involved in both large and small scale field measurement campaigns domestically and abroad.

Stratified and Rotating Flow

The Stratified and Rotating Flow Laboratory is headed by Dr. Joe Fernando.