Robert A. Brown

I perform research on the application of modeling, analysis, and numerical simulation to the development of fundamental understanding of transport processes and chemical physics in the processing of materials with microstructure. Research is currently underway in several applications that are modern examples of multi-scale modeling. One focus is the fluid mechanics of polymers melts and solutions where the configuration of the polymer molecules affects the rheology of the fluid. Current research is on the development of finite-element-based numerical methods for solving flow problems with constitutive descriptions that are based on either continuum-level descriptions of the state of stress in the fluid and kinetic theory based micro-mechanical models. These methods are used to predict flows, flow instabilities, and the microstructure induced by flow in polymer solutions.