Dr. Gang Xu

Institution: University of Central Oklahoma

Department: Engineering and Physics

Proposed research ideas: 

Topic: Fluid dynamics based multiphysics simulation for cilia-driven cellular motility, biomixing, and transport. Cilia and flagella are thin subcellular organelles that bend actively to propel cells (algae, sperms etc.) or move fluids and materials in human airways and other ventricles/passages. Ciliary motility is central to many biological functions and processes, from cellular motility and biomixing to transport of fluids and materials. These processes involve complex interactions between ciliary biomechanics and fluid dynamics. I expect to work closely with the proposed mentor to develop my research skills in computational fluid dynamics and multiphysics simulations, as well as to make progress on cilia-related projects.

Motivation:

I have had some basic training and experience in computational structural mechanics and fluid mechanics, and most of my projects involve some modeling to help explain the experimental data. However, I’d like to pursue more computational approaches including fluid dynamics based multiphysics. The cilia related projects I have been working on have big needs for the computational simulation.