Our primary expertise is in fluid turbulence. Other research interests include complex fluids, combustion, cryogenic helium, and nonlinear dynamics.

Over time, we have studied turbulence encompassing an ever increasing number of facets: in apparatus varying in size between millimeters and meters, in planetary atmosphere and oceans, in the cosmic microwave radiation, and so forth. 

We have built an apparatus for studying turbulence at a high Reynolds number of the order of two or three million and have developed new sensors for measurements in that apparatus; we are collaborating with the fluid physics group at the University of Oregon, with whom we have recently completed a set of heat transfer measurements at very high Rayleigh numbers over a large range; we have made high-Reynolds-number turbulence measurements in the atmosphere at Brookhaven and over dry salt-flats in Utah; we are making Particle Image Velocimetry measurements in cryogenic fluid systems; we have been making simulations of sheared turbulence to study the effects of shear and anisotropy; and we are working on the role of instability in determining the large structure of turbulence.

Because of the similarity in scaling that exists among a variety of systems far from equilibrium, we are interested in a broad class of non-equilibrium problems and see a natural connection between turbulence and recent developments in nonlinear dynamics, chaos, multifractals, and other areas of statistical and nonlinear physics. This connection has naturally bridged our work to physics and mathematics. We have strong ties to a body of interdisciplinary colleagues within and outside Yale, especially the Applied Mathematics group at Yale, the Chemical Physics Group at the Weizmann Institute and the Center for Nonlinear Science at Los Alamos. 

Curriculum vitae

Selected Publications:

"The Onset of Drag Reduction by Dilute Polymer Additives, and the Maximum Drag Reduction Symptote," K.R. Sreenivasan and C.M. White, J. Fluid Mech., 409, 149-164 (2000).

"Condensed Matter and Materials Physics: Basic Research for Tomorrow's Technology," K.R. Sreenivasan and fourteen co-authors, National Research Council Report (National Academy Press, Washington, D.C., 1999).

"Fluid Turbulence," K.R. Sreenivasan, Reviews of Modern Physics, 71, s383-s395 (1999); reprinted in More Things in Heaven and Earth: A Celebration of Physics at the Millennium, B. Bederson, ed. (Springer, New York, 1999), pp. 644-664.

Flow at Ultra-High Reynolds and Rayleigh Numbers: A Status Report, R.J. Donnelly and K.R. Sreenivasan, eds. (Springer Verlag, New York, 1998).