As we are moving closer to the end of this project I thought I should go over Dabiri's research. He is currently working on six projects, along with the help of his Graduate assistants. I have taken the basic objectives of the research and summarized them here.
1. Fluid Dynamic Efficiency of Unsteady Propulsion- The objective of this project is to develop general metrics for fluid dynamic efficiency that are sufficiently robust to facilitate quantitative comparison between engineering and biological propulsion systems.
2. Fluid Dynamic Energy Conversion- The goal of this project is to understand the mechanisms of fluid dynamic energy conversion by studying biological systems that are known to regularly accomplish this feat.
3. Lagrangian Analysis of Fluid Transport in Vortex Flows- This project is concerned with the application of theoretical methods of Lagrangian analysis to empirically measured flows.
4. Jellyfish Biomechanics- Medusae in the phylum Cnidaria are an integral component of ocean ecology and working with them provide studies aimed at uncovering design principles that have led to the success of more complex biological propulsion systems.
5. Optimal Vortex Formation- This research is aimed at developing a generic, quantitative framework in which to observe and characterize optimal vortex formation in biological fluid transport systems.
6. Biological Flow Velocimetry/Dynamometry- Effective flow visualization is essential to the analysis of biological propulsion systems. The flow patterns generated by jellyfish are used as a canonical application of the newly developed experimental methods.
The full description of this research can be found on Dabiri's CalTech webpage.
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I really appreciate this run down of his research projects. Very well done. On a side note: It's kind of amazing to me that he can actively be conducting 6 projects (my scientist is working on 4, which I thought was a lot), but I suppose if you have resources like willing grad students to do some of the work it wouldn't be too bad. Have you come across any indication that his students tend to tailor their studies to his interests or him tailoring his projects towards his grad students interests? That could be a definite source for serendipitous ideas.
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