Chris MacMinn

Supernumerary Fellow in Engineering Science; Associate Professor of Engineering Sciences

Teaching

I teach mathematics, computation, and fluid mechanics in the Department of Engineering Science. I currently give lectures in mathematics for all first-year students (e.g., Complex Numbers and Fourier Series, Ordinary Differential Equations) and in fluid mechanics for third- and fourth-year students (e.g., Hydraulics, Engineering Hydrology). I also lead a third-year project in engineering computation and I supervise a number of 4th year projects each year on topics ranging from hydraulic fracturing in shales to swelling in gels to particle tracking.

Research

I am interested in flow, transport, and deformation in multiphase systems, from fluids in the subsurface (e.g., water resources, migration and venting of natural gas, carbon capture and storage) to the mechanics of soft porous materials (e.g., the swelling of gels and tissues). I study these problems using a combination of mathematical models, numerical simulations, and high-resolution laboratory experiments. I put a strong emphasis on connecting microscale physical mechanisms with their macroscale consequences. My goal is to answer big-picture questions in engineering and the natural sciences by developing physical insight into the mechanics of these complex systems.

Selected Publications

Dynamics of swelling and drying in a spherical gel. T. Bertrand, J. Peixinho, S. Mukhopadhyay, and CWM. Physical Review Applied, 6:064010, 2016. http://dx.doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevApplied.6.064010

Wettability control on multiphase flow in patterned microfluidics. B Zhao, CWM, and R Juanes. PNAS, 113(37):10251–10256, 2016. http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1603387113

Fluid-driven deformation of a soft granular material. CWM, ER Dufresne, and JS Wettlaufer. Physical Review X, 5:011020, 2015. http://dx.doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevX.5.011020

Buoyant currents arrested by convective dissolution. CWM & R Juanes, Geophysical Research Letters, 40(10):2017-2022, 2013.  http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/grl.50473

Lifetime of carbon capture and storage as a climate-change mitigation technology. ML Szulczewski, CWM, HJ Herzog, and R Juanes, PNAS, 109(14):5185-5189, 2012. http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1115347109

For a full list of publications please see cwmacminn.com