News & Events

06-17-22

Benedikt Barthel, a graduate student working with Professor Beverley McKeon, is a recipient of the 2022 Richard B. Chapman Memorial Award. At Caltech he worked on the resolvent based analysis of turbulent flows. His work focuses on using variational, and optimization-based methods to extend the resolvent framework to the modeling of nonlinear dynamics. He is particularly interested in analytical and asymptotic methods, and how these can be combined with numerical, and data driven methods to derive simple yet useful models of complex physical phenomena. The Richard B. Chapman Memorial Award is given to an EAS graduate student in hydrodynamics who has distinguished himself or herself in research.

Tags: honors GALCIT Beverley McKeon Richard B. Chapman Memorial Award Benedikt Barthel

06-17-21

Simon Toedtli, a graduate student working with Professor Beverley McKeon, is the recipient of the 2021 Richard B. Chapman Memorial Award. His doctoral research combined direct numerical simulations and modal analyses to investigate the physics of closed-loop wall transpiration in a turbulent channel flow and to build low-order flow models for controller design. Both aspects contribute towards the development of drag-reducing control schemes for engineering applications, and will help make future transportation vessels more sustainable. Simon is continuing his studies in fluid mechanics as a postdoctoral fellow at Johns Hopkins University, where he will work on data assimilation for turbulent flows. The Richard B. Chapman Memorial Award is given to an EAS graduate student in hydrodynamics who has distinguished himself or herself in research.

Tags: honors GALCIT Beverley McKeon Richard B. Chapman Memorial Award Simon Toedtli

02-03-20

Professor Beverley J. McKeon, Theodore von Karman Professor of Aeronautics, has been elected as a Fellow in the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). AIAA confers the distinction of Fellow upon individuals in recognition of their notable and valuable contributions to the arts, sciences or technology of aeronautics and astronautics. [AIAA press release]

Tags: honors GALCIT CMS Beverley McKeon

12-24-19

The Journal of Fluid Mechanics has selected "Resolvent-based study of compressibility effects on supersonic turbulent boundary layers” by Bae, Dawson and McKeon as its cover article for volume 883, January 2020. 

Tags: GALCIT Beverley McKeon

11-06-19

Beverley McKeon, Theodore von Karman Professor of Aeronautics, has unlocked some of the secrets behind turbulence, a much-studied but difficult-to-pin-down phenomenon that mixes fluids when they flow past a solid boundary. "We knew that, underlying these very complicated structures, there had to be a very simple pattern. We just didn't know what that pattern was until now," says McKeon. [Caltech story]

Tags: research highlights GALCIT Beverley McKeon

08-21-19

Caltech Center for Autonomous Systems and Technologies (CAST) has awarded seed funding to three new collaborative projects. The first project was proposed by Aerospace postdoctoral scholar H. Jane Bae, along with Professors McKeon, Tropp, and Meiron. It aims to develop algorithms to predict the onset of extreme events in real time thus allowing autonomous air vehicles to avoid or compensate for the rough turbulent airflow. The second project was proposed by Professors Effros, and Murray and will focus a new approach to the analysis, design, and implementation of complex, networked systems with the goal of optimizing latency in information sharing. The third project was proposed by Professor Thompson and JPL colleagues I. Fenty, R. Castano, D. Limonadi, and G. Woodward. This project plans to take a step towards developing autonomous observing arrays that will use ocean robotics to deploy ice melt-rate instruments within ice shelf cavities.

Tags: GALCIT Beverley McKeon Michelle Effros Joel Tropp Andrew Thompson Richard Murray Dan Meiron postdocs H. Jane Bae I. Fenty R. Castano D. Limonadi G. Woodward

06-17-19

David Huynh, a graduate student working with Professor Beverley McKeon, is a recipient of the 2019 Richard B. Chapman Memorial Award. His doctoral research investigates the interaction between a turbulent boundary layer and a compliant surface through experiments that employed a unique dynamic roughness forcing. The Richard B. Chapman Memorial Award is given to an EAS graduate student in hydrodynamics who has distinguished himself or herself in research.

Tags: honors GALCIT Beverley McKeon Richard B. Chapman Memorial Award David Huynh

01-02-19

This summer, Maria Hernandez—a student at Santa Monica Community College—lived in Caltech student housing and spent her days in Professor Beverley McKeon's lab, building an autonomous submersible robot from scratch. This was the second summer in a row that Hernandez participated in a program through the nonprofit organization Base 11, which connects high-achieving, underrepresented students from community colleges throughout the country with top research institutions like Caltech. "This program gave me the inspiration to become an engineer," says Hernandez, now in her fourth year of college. "Throughout high school, I was always good at math, but I never really knew what engineering was. The closest thing to an engineer in the community I grew up in was a mechanic." [Caltech story] [ENGenious snap shot]

Tags: GALCIT Beverley McKeon teaching Maria Hernandez

06-12-18

Beverley J. McKeon, Theodore von Karman Professor of Aeronautics, is the recipient of the 2018 Northrop Grumman Prize for Excellence in Teaching. The Prize is awarded to an EAS professor who demonstrates, in the broadest sense, unusual ability, creativity, and innovation in undergraduate and graduate classroom or laboratory teaching. A nomination for Professor Mckeon read, “she is a firm believer in the importance of having all students, regardless of their ultimate specialty, participate in laboratory coursework. Her courses serve as a solid foundation for graduate level research across disciplines, both technically and with regards to skills relevant to doctoral and industrial research. She takes tough subjects and uses her colorful approach to make the concept easy to comprehend.” [Caltech story]

Tags: honors GALCIT Beverley McKeon teaching

06-14-17

The Caltech Graduate Student Council (GSC) has selected Professor Beverley McKeon as the recipient of the 2016-2017, GSC Mentoring Award. The GSC Teaching and Mentoring Awards recognize individuals “who have an extraordinary impact on Caltech graduate students through their roles as teachers and mentors.” Nominations submitted by graduate students, both within and outside of GALCIT, described her commitment as a mentor.  The nominations highlighted her attentiveness, inclusivity, and great support for students. 

Tags: honors GALCIT Beverley McKeon