Advanced Fluid Mechanics 3: Potential Flows & Boundary Layers

This course covers potential flow analysis for inviscid flows, the generation of vorticity in viscous boundary layers, connections between circulation and lift, generation of drag in the boundary layer, geometric effects in flow separation, and transition to turbulence. A separate final short module briefly introduces the role of surface tension in engineering fluid mechanics. This course features lecture and demo videos, lecture concept checks, practice problems, and extensive problem sets.

This course is the final module of a three-course sequence in incompressible fluid mechanics: Advanced Fluid Mechanics:1. Fundamentals; Advanced Fluid Mechanics: 2. The Navier-Stokes Equations for Viscous Flows, and Advanced Fluid Mechanics: 3. Potential Flows, Lift, Circulation & Boundary Layers. The series is based on material in MIT’s class 2.25 Advanced Fluid Mechanics, one of the most popular first-year graduate classes in MIT’s Mechanical Engineering Department. This series is designed to help people gain the ability to apply the governing equations, the principles of dimensional analysis and scaling theory to develop physically-based, approximate models of complex fluid physics phenomena. People who complete these three consecutive courses will be able to apply their knowledge to analyze and break down complex problems they may encounter in industrial and academic research settings.

The material is of relevance to engineers and scientists across a wide range of mechanical, chemical and process industries who must understand, analyze and optimize flow processes and fluids handling problems. Applications are drawn from hydraulics, aero & hydrodynamics as well as the chemical process industries.

1. Potential Flow Solutions for Ideal Inviscid Flows
2. Vorticity, Circulation and Lift
3. The Viscous Boundary layer and transition to turbulence
4. Flow Separation, and the effect on drag and lift
5. Brief introduction to surface tension phenomena in fluid mechanics