Peter Monkewitz

After graduating in physics from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, he received his Ph.D. from the same institution in 1977 with a thesis on internal acoustics. From 1977-80 he was a research associate in the Aerospace Department of the Univ. of Southern California in Los Angeles, where he worked experimentally and theoretically on jet noise and hydrodynamic instabilities. In 1980 he joined the faculty of the School of Engineering at UCLA where he made research contributions in several areas. In the field of hydrodynamic instability he had a hand in the popularization of the concept of absolute instability in fluid mechanics, the development of the concept as well as of the asymptotic analytical description of global modes in nonparallel flows, and in the modelling of vortex shedding from bluff bodies. Other areas of research include internal acoustics, jet mixing, in particular in low-density jets in which he co-discovered enhanced mixing by "side-jets," flow control, transition to turbulence, turbulence and, most recently, flame instabilities. In 1988 he was awarded the Humboldt prize and spent the academic year 1989/90 as Humboldt awardee at the Technical University in Berlin. In 1992 he was elected Fellow of the American Physical Society. Since 1993 he holds the chair for experimental fluid mechanics and heads the Laboratory of Fluid Mechanics (LMF) of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland. He has been Chairman of its Mechanical Engineering Department from July 1997 to December 2000, co-organizer of the 1999 Research programme on turbulence at the Isaac Newton Institute in Cambridge, UK, Associate Editor of the Journal of Fluid Mechanics from 1995 to 2000 and a member of the EUROMECH Council. He is currently an Associate Editor of Physics of Fluids , a member of the IUTAM general assembly, a member of the schoolwide EPFL Academic Promotions Committee and part-time "program monitor" for the Swiss National Science Foundation (member of its Research Council).

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ME-608: Methods of asymptotic analysis in mechanics

The introduction to asymptotic analysis provides the basis for constructing many simplified analytical models in mechanics and for testing computations in limiting cases.

Uncertainty Analysis of the Von Karman Constant for the Mean Centerline Velocity in CICLoPE

Peter Monkewitz

Further examination of the pressure measurement uncertainties in determining the pressure gradient along the fully-developed section of CICLoPE, yields a Karman constant based on the centerline veloci

SPRINGER INTERNATIONAL PUBLISHING AG2019

Revisiting the quest for a universal log-law and the role of pressure gradient in "canonical" wall-bounded turbulent flows

Peter Monkewitz

The trinity of so-called "canonical" wall-bounded turbulent flows, comprising the zero pressure gradient turbulent boundary layer, abbreviated ZPG TBL, turbulent pipe flow, and channel/duct flows has

Amer Physical Soc2017

Katabatic Flow: A Closed-Form Solution with Spatially-Varying Eddy Diffusivities

Jiannong Fang, Peter Monkewitz, Marc Parlange, Marco Giovanni Giometto

The Nieuwstadt closed-form solution for the stationary Ekman layer is generalized for katabatic flows within the conceptual framework of the Prandtl model. The proposed solution is valid for spatially

Springer Verlag2017

In fluid mechanics, the Reynolds number (Re) is a dimensionless quantity that helps predict fluid flow patterns in different situations by measuring the ratio between inertial and viscous forces. At low Reynolds numbers, flows tend to be dominated by laminar (sheet-like) flow, while at high Reynolds numbers, flows tend to be turbulent. The turbulence results from differences in the fluid's speed and direction, which may sometimes intersect or even move counter to the overall direction of the flow (eddy currents).

In physics and fluid mechanics, a boundary layer is the thin layer of fluid in the immediate vicinity of a bounding surface formed by the fluid flowing along the surface. The fluid's interaction with the wall induces a no-slip boundary condition (zero velocity at the wall). The flow velocity then monotonically increases above the surface until it returns to the bulk flow velocity. The thin layer consisting of fluid whose velocity has not yet returned to the bulk flow velocity is called the velocity boundary layer.

In fluid dynamics, turbulence or turbulent flow is fluid motion characterized by chaotic changes in pressure and flow velocity. It is in contrast to a laminar flow, which occurs when a fluid flows in parallel layers, with no disruption between those layers. Turbulence is commonly observed in everyday phenomena such as surf, fast flowing rivers, billowing storm clouds, or smoke from a chimney, and most fluid flows occurring in nature or created in engineering applications are turbulent.