Rieveschl Lecture Looks Into Life Cycle Of Drops

Sidney Nagel, the Stein-Freiler Distinguished Service Professor in the University of Chicago physics department, will present “The Life and Death of a Drop” at 4:00 p.m. Thursday, May 3, in Room 301 Braunstein Hall (Old Physics Building) on the University of Cincinnati campus. Nagel’s lecture is the eighth in an annual series of interdisciplinary lectures honoring UC alumnus George Rievesch Jr., inventor of the first antihistamine, Benadryl. The lecture is free and open to the public.

Waves crashing into the shore, a faucet leaking in the night, and bubbles dissolving gas into the oceans are but a few examples of drop formation. They are also examples of a liquid changing its topology.  Nagel will review how the life cycle of a drop - from first formation to final disappearance - reveals delightful and profound scientific surprises.

Nagel’s work has focused on phenomena often regarded as outside the realm of physics, including drops, granular materials and jamming. He has also investigated the properties of disordered materials such as glasses and disordered systems such as piles of sand. Nagel received his B.A. from Columbia University in 1969 and his Ph,D. from Princeton University in 1974. He has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences and has received the Oliver Buckley Prize from the American Physical Society.