Our research involves experimental studies of the dynamics of soft-condensed matter and fluid systems. Current experiments use high speed video imaging to measure particle trajectories in granular and turbulent flows.

Transient Dynamics of Granular Gasses: We are exploring whether granular hydrodynamic models that have been successful in describing steadily driven granular gasses can also predict the dynamics during gravitational collapse. In a quasi-2D granular gas driven by vertical vibration we can measure the trajectories of every particle in the system. We hope to uncover details about how the hydrodynamic models begin to fail as the system approaches the dense static state.