This textbook is a pedagogic introduction to a number of phenomena employing fluid mechanics. Beginning with basic concepts and conservation laws for neutral and charged fluids, the authors apply and develop them to understand aerodynamics, locomotion of micro-organisms, waves in air and water, shock waves, hydrodynamic and hydromagnetic instabilities, stars and black holes, blood flow in humans, and superfluids. The approach is to consider various striking topics on fluid mechanics, without losing necessary mathematical rigor. The book balances the qualitative explanations with formal treatment, in a compact manner. A special focus is given to the important and difficult subject of turbulence and the book ends with a discussion on turbulence in quantum fluids. The textbook is dotted by a number of illustrative examples, mostly from real life, and exercises.
The textbook is designed for a one semester course and addresses students at undergraduate and graduate level in physicsor engineering, who want to research in the fields as diverse as aeronautics, meteorology, cosmology, biomechanics, and mathematical physics. It is requested knowledge of an undergraduate level course on mathematical methods to better understand the topics presented here.
Sudhir Ranjan Jain is the Head of the Theoretical Nuclear Physics and Quantum Computing Section at Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC); Professor at Homi Bhabha National Institute; and Adjunct Professor at UM-DAE Centre for Excellence in Basic Sciences. After completing the B.Sc. (Hons) in Physics at the Hindu College of Univ. Delhi, he postgraduated at I.I.T. Delhi (1985). Since 1987, he is working at BARC. He obtained the Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from the Univ. Mumbai in 1994, after which he was Checheur Libre at Centre for Nonlinear Phenomena and Complex Systems, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium (1995, 1996). He published 90+ papers in refereed journals; several review articles including one in Reviews of Modern Physics on quantum billiards in 2017. He is the author of the book Mechanics, waves and thermodynamics published by CUP in 2016. During his career, Prof. Jain has taught almost all courses in Physics Curriculum since 1987 at the TrainingSchool, BARC, and, later at the UM-DAE CEBS. He supervised students for doctoral research as well as many undergraduates whose mentoring he cherishes the most. He is the convener of several international conferences on complex quantum systems and DAE symposia on nuclear physics, as well as, the organizer of DST-SERB schools on nonlinear dynamics.
Bhooshan S. Paradkar completed his M.S. (2009) and Ph.D. (2012) in Engineering Physics at the University of California, San Diego, USA. After being a postdoctoral fellow (2012-2015) at the Laboratoire de Physique des Gaz et Des Plasmas, Université Paris-Saclay, he joined the UM-DAE Centre for Excellence in Basic Sciences, where he has been an Assistant Professor since 2017. His research interests are in plasma physics, relativistic laser-plasma interaction, and computational physics. In the last 5 years, he has been involved in teaching courses on fluid mechanics and plasma physics.
Shashikumar M. Chitre (1936-2021) graduated in Mathematics at the Elphinstone College, University of Mumbai, in 1959. He went on to the Peterhouse College, University of Cambridge, where he completed his M.A. in Mathematics and Ph. D. at the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, University of Cambridge (1963). He was a Lecturer at the University of Leeds (1963-1966); Fellow at California Institute of Technology, USA (1966-1967); and a faculty member at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (1967-2001). Prof. Chitre was an elected Fellow of all three National Academies of Sciences of India, and, The Third World Academy of Sciences. He was one of the Founding Members of the UM-DAE Centre for Excellence in Basic Sciences. For his enormous contributions to research in astrophysics, education, and public service, he was awarded the third highest civilian honour, Padma Bhushan, by the Government of India in 2012.
