IUTAM Symposium on

Overview

Particle and particle-fluid flows are ubiquitous in nature and in industrial processes, yet their mechanics and kinematics is not well understood. Several factors contribute to the lack of understanding of these systems, such as the complex nature of interactions (e.g., friction in dry systems, hydrodynamic interactions in suspensions), limited understanding of the statistics of interactions and microstructure, and the strong dependence of these properties on the nature of forcing. The emphasis of this meeting will be on the regimes of flow wherein the particles are "mobile", or free to flow, and hence the title.

In recent years, the study of particle-fluid flow has been extended to the biological realm, such as in suspensions of swimming microorganisms and the flow of blood. The early fluid-dynamical investigations in this field involved the study of individual swimmers or the shape and motion of a single cell, but this has recently evolved into the study of a collection of swimmers or cells. This is an important new direction in the field of suspension mechanics, which holds significant promise in the understanding of important problems in biology.

This symposium hopes to bring together the substantial expertise present in diverse disciplines to further our understanding of these systems. We hope to bring together scholars and researchers in engineering, physics, mechanics and mathematics. We propose to have a blend of experimental, computational and analytical presentations, and a judicious mix of young and senior scholars. We hope that this symposium will bring us closer to developing accurate macroscopic descriptions and constitutive relations for mobile particulate systems. Our second and equally important motivation is to bring young scholars and graduate students in contact with the best scientists and engineers working in the field, in an atmosphere that is conducive to informal interaction and exchange of ideas.

Scientific Committee

Prof. J. F. Brady, California Institute of Technology, USA

Prof. J. D. Goddard, University of California at San Diego, USA

Prof. E. Guazzelli, Aix-Marseille Universite, France

Prof. H. Hayakawa, Kyoto University, Japan

Prof. D. Khakhar, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, India

Prof. L. G. Leal, University of California at Santa Barbara, USA

Prof. P. Nott, Indian Institute of Science, India

Prof. S. Sundaresan , Princeton University, USA

Organising Committee

Prof. Prabhu R. Nott, Indian Institute of Science Bangalore, India

Prof. V. Kumaran, Indian Institute of Science Bangalore, India

Prof. I. Sharma, Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, India

Prof. M. Bose, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, India

Prof. T. Murthy, Indian Institute of Science Bangalore, India