\u201cClimate is the biggest problem for humankind today. With new computer models, we can predict the motion and turbulence of the atmosphere. This is a much more accurate way to forecast weather.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
\u201cClimate is the biggest problem for humankind today,\u201d Matheou says. \u201cWith new computer models, we can predict the motion and turbulence of the atmosphere, and therefore predict wind patterns, thunderstorms, temperature, humidity, and hurricanes, for example. This is a much more accurate way to forecast weather.\u201d<\/p>\n
The computer model isn\u2019t only useful to scientists, it\u2019s pretty too. And in video form, it appears as a crystal-clear rendering of real clouds.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe video is sort of a byproduct of our research on cloud and the atmosphere,\u201d says Matheou, who heads UConn\u2019s Computational Fluid Dynamics Group<\/a>. \u201cWhen we\u2019re doing the simulations, they create a nice visual, which we can use to engage people in our research. They\u2019re scientific and visually interesting.\u201d<\/p>\n A projected video of Matheou\u2019s cloud simulations is currently on display in a traveling exhibit, \u201cChaosmosis: Assigning Rhythm to the Turbulent<\/a>.\u201d This art exhibition, housed at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington D.C., is inspired by fluid dynamics.<\/p>\n The exhibition draws from past submissions to the American Physical Society\u2019s Gallery of Fluid Motion, an annual program that serves as a visual record of the aesthetic and science of contemporary fluid dynamics. Matheou\u2019s video\u2014\u201cLarge-eddy simulation of cumulus clouds<\/a>\u201d\u2014won the Gallery of Fluid Motion contest in November 2021.<\/p>\n His video is among 11 works on view, which range from photography and video to sculpture and sound. In the video viewers watch, from a static point of view, clouds forming in fast motion. This later changes to an airborne perspective, to give the views a dreamlike sensation of flying.<\/p>\n \u201cSimulation is an additional tool for discovery, enabling us to conduct experiments that offer new insights into the intricate nature of clouds, particularly as our planet\u2019s climate becomes more volatile,\u201d Matheou said.<\/p>\n Matheou joined UConn\u2019s School of Mechanical, Aerospace and Manufacturing in August 2017 from NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He combines theory, modeling, computational algorithms, and remote sensing data to understand and predict complex multi-physics fluid flows.<\/p>\n His work on large-eddy simulations was recently published in Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences<\/a> in 2022; Physical Review Fluids<\/em><\/a> in 2022; Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society<\/em><\/a> in 2022; and the Journal of Computational Physics<\/em><\/a> in 2021.<\/p>\n \u201cChaosmosis: Assigning Rhythm to the Turbulent\u201d is on exhibit until Feb. 23 at the National Academy of Sciences, 2101 Constitution Ave., N.W., Washington, D.C. The term chaosmosis, coined by the philosopher F\u00e9lix Guattari in the 1990s, conveys the idea of transforming chaos into complexity. The exhibition is curated in coordination with the American Physical Society, Division of Fluid Dynamics.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A video created by Georgios Matheou, associate professor of mechanical engineering, depicts a computer-generated cloud model that is used to make accurate weather predictions. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":201,"featured_media":209778,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1866],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[2514],"class_list":["post-209777","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-engr"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-09 08:50:07","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209777","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/201"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=209777"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209777\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":209867,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209777\/revisions\/209867"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/209778"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=209777"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=209777"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=209777"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=209777"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=209777"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"NAS](\"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/02\/NAS-gallery-1024x692.png\")