Ever wonder why you don't see mosquitoes on a windy day? The answer to that question is important not only to campers but also to mathematicians who try to understand turbulence in gases and liquids, with applications in everything from weather forecasting to mixing industrial chemicals. There are standard mathematical models that describe how a particle will move in a turbulent fluid, but up to now no one has been able to check the models against real measurements at high degrees of agitation because the particles sometimes move too fast to measure. Now, Cornell University researchers, using techniques developed to observe subatomic particles, have measured turbulent flow in liquids over a wide range of velocities and have come up with some surprising results: Particles often get an extra kick that accelerates them out of proportion to the general motion of the fluid.
Peter Gierasch, the distinguished Cornell University scientist who has almost "written the book" on planetary atmospheres, will be honored at a two-day seminar March 2 and 3.
Cornell University's Global Seminar 480, a course that connects students in seven countries across 16 time zones, will be given the 2001 Excellence in Distance Education Award by the American Distance Education Consortium March 5 in Arlington, Va.
Benjamin Zander, conductor of the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra, is guest speaker for the Johnson Graduate School of Management's Park Leadership Series, Tuesday, March 6, from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. in Barnes Hall auditorium.
Z. Jane Wang, assistant professor of theoretical and applied mechanics at Cornell, has received one of 26 Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Program awards to continue her studies of insect flight dynamics in Cornell's College of Engineering.
The Ford Foundation has awarded $300,000 to Cornell University's Africana Studies and Research Center to help strengthen and sustain the presence of contemporary African and African Diaspora artists on a global scale.
Luis Alberto Moreno, the Colombian ambassador to the United States, and U.S. Congressman Maurice Hinchey (D-N.Y.) will discuss Plan Colombia, the $7.5 billion strategy aimed at breaking the grip of drug traffickers and negotiating with left-wing guerillas in that country.
In her classic 1963 book The Feminine Mystique, feminist Betty Friedan identified "the problem that has no name" -- the dissatisfaction many women of her generation.
Cornell undergraduates with a passion for social change can exercise their instincts for community service and receive credits through the new Henry E. and Nancy Horton Bartels Undergraduate Action Research Fellowship Program.
SAN FRANCISCO -- If California energy officials had paid closer attention to mathematics and the commodities market yesterday, much of the state could be experiencing less of an energy crisis today. A systematic use of market contracts, called options, purchased before the crisis happened, might have alleviated it, says Philip Protter, a researcher at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. Protter stresses that it is unclear why new types of options, called energy derivatives, were not used to good effect. This, he says, could have been the fault of regulators, or utilities themselves, "or the inadequacies of what is, after all, a new kind of market."
