In this video Prashant talks about how he develops bespoke mathematical solutions to multiphase flow problems all around us: industry (e.g. oil-gas transport), environment (e.g. industrial cleaning) or the human body (e.g. brain cooling via flow).
 
Background:

I am Prash Valluri working at the Institute for Materials and Processes in the School of Engineering. Though I am a Chemical Engineer by training, my research in fluid dynamics is highly interdisciplinary making me a “fluid dynamicist” too.

My research centres on understanding complex flows involving one or more phases encountered using mathematical modelling in critical global challenges. Primarily these are difficult and diverse problems in the energy (e.g. flows in long-distance oil-gas pipelines, refinery distillation columns, post-combustion carbon capture, liquid cooling of microelectronic devices), environment (e.g. cleaning in process plants, water treatment) and health (e.g. blood flows in arteries, enzyme interactions) sectors. For example, understanding blood flow in arteries will enable us to identify any stagnation regions, which is indicative of possible sites for plaque deposition. Also understanding how two phases flow in pipelines is crucial towards economising transcontinental transport of crude oil and natural gas. I use advanced mathematical and computational tools to critically understand the flow behaviour in these complex systems. The mathematical tools I develop solve the governing equations of flow and transport (conservation of mass, momentum and energy) in 3D. This is possible nowadays because of the availability of powerful computational resources like HECToR, the UK’s National Supercomputer based at Edinburgh.

I collaborate extensively with experimentalists based at my home School (Engineering) giving me an opportunity to validate my models against experimental data. I also collaborate with medics and clinicians at the Western General Hospital and the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, exchanging crucial data and know-how, in projects concerning biological fluid dynamics. I also collaborate with a number of industrial partners in projects concerning with Energy and usually most of my projects have national/international academic collaborators. These external links are crucial to ensure long term impact (via Industry) and coherent dissemination of our work.

Find out more:

Dr Prashant Valluri, School of Engineering profile: http://www.eng.ed.ac.uk/about/people/dr-prashant-valluri
Edinburgh Research Explorer: http://www.research.ed.ac.uk/portal/pvalluri