Vivek Narsimhan
Michael Ott Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering
Purdue University
School of Chemical Engineering
Forney Hall of Chemical Engineering
480 Stadium Mall Drive
West Lafayette, IN 47907-2100
Research Interests
Lab website
Dr. Narsimhan's research uses a mixture of theory, simulations, and experiments to examine problems in the areas of suspensions, complex interfaces, fluid mechanics, and polymers. He has developed mathematical models, performed simulations, and conducted experiments to describe the mechanics of droplets, red blood cells, and vesicles under various flow types and microfluidic geometries. These investigations provide insight into how complex membranes alter the mechanical stability and motion of fluid-filled particles, both individually and as a suspension. Dr. Narsimhan has also simulated the jamming and translocation dynamics of knotted polymers. He has modeled the relaxation of knotted DNA that has been validated by single-molecule experiments. These studies have possible applications in next-generation DNA mapping/sequencing as well as providing insight into the dynamics of entanglements in polymer systems.