Abstract
Suspensions are very prominent both in nature and industry and ranges from micro-,
bio-devices to sediments in rivers. This seminar will present the numerical methods that
employs constitutive laws to predict the flow transitions and onset of the instabilities of
semi-dilute and concentrated suspensions in geometries including Taylor-Couette flow for
very low particle and suspension Reynolds numbers. It also covers the transition of
suspensions with the existence of thermal convection, i.e., Rayleigh-Bénard convection.
Different regimes of the transitions of suspension flows and their comparison with the pure
Newtonian fluid in similar geometries will be discussed. The experimental analysis of the
suspension flows over porous structures performed by Magnetic Resonance imaging (MRI)
and PIV (Particle Image Velocimetry) techniques will be also introduced. The insights
gathered from these analyses will lead to novel methods to control particles in the flow and
near the wall in a wide range of industries and technologies related to the processing and
transports of suspension flows.
About the Speaker
Dr. Parisa Mirbod is currently an Associate Professor in the Mechanical and Industrial
Engineering Department at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She received her PhD
degree from City University of New York-Graduate Center with Prof. Sheldon Weinbaum
& Prof. Yiannis Andreopoulos and she did her Postdoctoral with Prof. Jeffrey F. Morris at
Benjamin Levich Institute, New York. She has built her career on deriving innovative
theoretical, computational, and experimental methods for fluid mechanics, complex fluids,
particle laden flows, and flow over and through permeable surfaces. Her research has been
funded by agencies including National Science foundation (NSF) and Department of
Defense-Army Research Office (DOD-ARO). She received the I@UNITO Faculty
fellowship from University of Turin. She is also a recipient of the IFPA-New investigator
NIH award and a recipient of the NASA Glenn Faculty Fellowship. She looks forward to
stimulating technical discussions during the seminar.
Host: Professor Leo Chamorro
