Vortex Wakes of Airplanes, Helicopters, and Wind Turbines: Structure and Stability

In this talk, Visiting Professor, Dr Stéphane Le Dizès will present results that he obtained with colleagues and students at IRPHE on the vortex wakes generated by airplanes, helicopters, and wind turbines over the last 20 years.

He will show that simple vortex models (vortex pairs for airplanes, multiple helical vortices for helicopters and wind turbines), from which instability properties can be derived, can be used to analyze and describe wake evolution.  This inaugural lecture will outline how various theoretical predictions are validated by direct numerical simulations and laboratory experiments.

About the Speaker

Dr Stéphane Le Dizès is a Directeur de Recherche at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS). He works at IRPHE, a joint research institute affiliated with CNRS, Aix-Marseille University, and Centrale Méditerranée, which he previously directed from 2018 to 2023. After graduate studies at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris, he earned his PhD from École Polytechnique in 1994.

His scientific work focuses on fundamental problems in fluid mechanics, particularly hydrodynamic stability, vortex dynamics, and waves in stratified and rotating fluids. His research combines theoretical modelling, asymptotic analysis, and numerical simulations to understand flow behaviours in aerodynamics, geophysics, and astrophysics.

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