Howard Stone
Fluid Dynamics

Professor Stone and his research group investigate fluid motions dominated by viscosity, so-called low-Reynolds number flows, in non-living and biological systems. Theory and experiment are combined in studies of lubricating motions, coating flows, flows and transport processes in micro-devices, the flow of suspensions, the way in which fluid moves in foams and dense colloidal suspensions. Also of interest are the dynamics of fluid-fluid interfaces, e.g. stretching and breakup of fluid threads, and effects of electrical fields on drops and other fluid-fluid interfaces. Finally, many biological phenomena occur in the viscously-dominated flow limit and Professor Stone studies problems in this area such as the flow of lipid monolayers and bilayers and the motions of particles suspended in such interfacial layers.

Publications:
Abkarian, M., Nunes, J. and Stone, H.A. 2004. Colloidal crystallization and banding in a cylindrical geometry. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 126: 5978-5979.

Link, D.R., Anna, S.L., Weitz, D.A. and Stone, H.A. 2004. Geometrically-mediated breakup of drops in microfluidic devices. Phys. Rev. Lett. 92: 054503.

Strock, A.D., Dertinger, S.K., Ajdari, A., Mezic, I., Stone, H.A. and Whitesides, G.M. 2002. Chaotic mixer for microchannels. Science 295: 647-651.

Hilgenfeldt, S., Kraynik, A.M., Koehler, S.A. and Stone, H.A. 2001. An accurate von Neumann’s law for three-dimensional foams. Phys. Rev. Lett. 86: 2685-2688.