Botanical fluid mechanics

“Botanical fluid mechanics” is not a formal field, but is an accurate description of some problems that I have worked on.  There are many fascinating problems to do with the properties and motion of fluids in plants, and much remains to be done.  There are also fascinating problems to do with the solid mechanics in plants.

A critical challenge for plant reproduction is ensuring that pollen is removed from the structures that produce it and carried away from the parent plant.  In the case of anemophilous, that is wind-pollinated, plants, fluid mechanics in the form of the wind is responsible for this process.  In paper 34, we examine a model problem of the motion of a sphere (pollen) away from a deformable surface (plant).  In paper 43, we give a possible resolution to the “pollen paradox”, according to which wind gusts should not be strong enough to remove pollen from plants.  The following photographs show examples of Thalictrum and willow staments as well as willow pollen.

This work was supported by the Human Frontiers Science Program.