Mathematics Colloquia and Seminars

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Non-Newtonian or complex fluids describe a wide class of materials from biological fluids like mucus and blood to everyday household products like shampoo and paint. There are many open questions in the study of such materials that involve deriving appropriate constitutive models, studying mathematical well-posedness of these systems, and improving numerical schemes for these models. There are also many problems in physics and biology where understanding motion of (or in) complex fluids is essential for understanding natural phenomena. Tools from mathematical analysis and computational simulations can shed light on these complex problems that are significant in many biological, environmental, and industrial applications. I will describe some current and open research problems in the field including recent work on modeling sperm swimming in viscoelastic fluids, and understanding the origins of instabilities in viscoelastic fluid flows.

Lunch is served.