Fotis Sotiropoulos
Fotis Sotiropoulos
Adjunct Professor, Department of Civil, Environmental, and Geo- EngineeringContact
Education
- Ph.D., 1991, Aerospace Engineering, University of Cincinnati
- M.S., 1989, Aerospace Engineering, Penn State University
- B.S., 1986, Mechanical Engineering, National Technical University of Athens, Greece
Professional Background
- Professor, CEE/ME Georgia Institute of Technology, 2005
- Associate Professor (joint appointment) ME, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2002-2005
- Associate Professor, CEE, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2000-2005
- Assistant Professor, CEE, Georgia Institute of Technology, 1995-2000
- Assistant Research Scientist, Iowa Institute for Hydraulics Research, University of Iowa, 1994-1995
- Postdoctoral Associate, Iowa Institute for Hydraulics Research, University of Iowa, 1991-1994
My research centers on computational fluid dynamics, spanning a diverse and cross-disciplinary range of topics in biofluids, hydraulics, environmental fluid mechanics, chaotic advection, and large-scale transport in geophysical flows. A major thrust of my research is the development of advanced numerical algorithms for simulating turbulent flows in real-life natural and man-made environments using statistical turbulence models that directly resolve the dynamics of unsteady, coherent structures. These algorithms are applied to simulate sediment transport by large-scale vortices in the vicinity of bridge foundations, turbulent flows in hydraulic machinery, stratified and buoyancy dominated flows in lakes and reservoirs, and turbulent mixing in water and wastewater treatment mixing devices and in water storage facilities. My research group also developed a novel computational technique for simulating flows in domains with 3D, arbitrarily complex, flexible immersed boundaries. This technique is being used to tackle computationally problems that reside at the interface between fluid mechanics with biology and bioengineering. Projects include the simulation of various cardiovascular flows, with emphasis on biomedical devices and virtual surgery, hydrodynamics of aquatic locomotion, and hydrodynamic signal detection by planktonic organisms. Another area of research is the experimental and computational investigation of Lagrangian coherent structure dynamics in chaotically advected flows as well as in large scale geophysical and environmental flows.
Selected Publications
Chamorro, L.; Lee, S.-J.; Olsen, D.; Milliren, C.; Arndt, R.; Sotriopoulos, F. 2015. Turbulence effects on a full-scale 2.5 MW horizontal-axis wind turbine under neutrally stratified conditions. Wind Energy. 18(2): 339-349.
Yang, X.; Howard, K.; Guala, M.; Sotiropoulos, F. 2015. Effects of three-dimensional hill on the wake characteristics of a model wind turbine. Physics of Fluids. 27(2).
Kazakidi, A.; Tsakiris, D.; Angelidis, D.; Sotiropoulos, F.; Ekaterinaris, J. 2015. CFD study of aquatic thrust generation by an octopus-like arm under intense prescribed deformations. Computers and Fluids. 115: 54-65.
Morris, M.; Haji Mohammadi, M.; Day, S.; Hondzo, M.; Sotiropoulos, F. 2015. Prediction of Glossosoma biomass spatial distribution in Valley Creek by field measurements and a three-dimensional turbulent open-channel flow model. Water Resources Research. 51(3): 1457-1471.
Kang, S., Sotriopoulos, F. 2015. Numerical study of flow dynamics around a stream restoration structure in a meandering channel. Journal of Hydraulic Research. 53(2): 178-185.
Khosronejad, A.; Kozarek, J.; Palmsten, M.; Sotiropoulos, F. 2015. Numerical simulation of large dunes in meandering streams and rivers win in-stream rock structures. Advances in Water Resources. 81: 45-61.
Chamorro, L.; Hill, C.; Neary, V.; Gunawan, B.; Arndt, R.; Sotriopoulos, F. 2015. Effects of energetic coherent motions on the power and wake of an axial-flow turbine. Physics of Fluids. 27(5).
Yang, X.; Sotriopoulos, F.; Conzemius, R.; Wachtler, J.; Strong, M. 2014. Large-eddy simulation of turbulent flow past wind turbines/farms: The Virtual Wind Simulator (VWiS). Wind Energy.
Calderer, A.; Kang, S.; Sotriopoulos, F. 2014. Level set immersed boundary method for coupled simulation of air/water interaction with complex floating structures. Journal of Computational Physics. 277: 201-227.
Chamorro, L.; Tobin, N.; Arndt, R.; Sotiropoulos, F. 2014. Variable sized wind turbines are a possibility for wind farm optimization. Wind Energy. 17(10): 1483-1494.