Introduction to Interactive Boundary Layer Theory by Ian Sobey, Oxford
University Press, £45, ISBN 0198506759
Turbulent Flows by Stephen Pope, Cambridge University Press, £29.95,
ISBN 0521598869
THE actions of fluids intrigue artists, engineers, biologists and physicists
alike. Leonardo da Vinci’s drawings of turbulent eddies testify as much.
Practical topics include trivial events such as a drop of rain splashing into a
puddle, and the complexities of blood flowing through the heart and the flow
around a racing yacht or aerofoil.
To understand the physics of such flows you need to model them
mathematically, and this task often presents formidable complexities.…
