Hi all! I defended my Ph.D. thesis back in 2019 and I also served as the creator and moderator for the subreddit r/FluidMechanics for a long time. I think with that I have gathered enough experience and courage to answer some of your queries. Some broad topics that I can answer questions on are:
- computation fluid mechanics
- scientific programming and HPC
- nonlinear shallow water equations
- statistical description of turbulence: spectra, energy budget etc.
- experimental methods: PIV
- stratified turbulence
- academia
- navigating your career pre- and post-Ph.D.
Ask away!
What is stratified turbulance?
A stratified fluid has some layers stacked vertically due to changing temperature (as is the case in atmosphere) and changing density or both (as is the case in ocean). Typically the temperature or density decreases as we go up, in which case we say the fluid is “stably stratified”. However since these system experience a lot of external energy input (think radiation, waves or circulation), the fluid is pushed around and is essentially in a turbulent state. This idealized system can be studied theoretically / computationally (in a periodic box) and experimentally (in a salty water tank) as an analogue for the atmosphere and ocean.