This award will support junior US researchers to attend an international conference titled, "Fluids and Health," which will be held July 23 through August 2, 2019 at the Cargese Institute for Scientific Studies in Cargese, Corsica, France. The conference will focus on multiphase and complex flows applied to problems in infectious disease, including disease and pathogen transmission, multiscale transport in air and water, spray processes, infection control and mathematical modeling of disease transmission and containment. The conference will provide US graduate students, postdoctoral scholars and young faculty members with opportunities to engage with leaders in multiphase fluid dynamics and physicians and medical researchers in a unique setting that allows for exchange between scientists, engineers, and health care professionals.
"Fluids and Health" is a new conference that has been organized by Lydia Bourouiba from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The goal is to help develop a new community of researchers who will undertake research into the role fluid dynamics and multiphase processes play in infectious disease. The product of such research could be improved mechanistic understandings of pathogen transmission, which would be a significant improvement over current, mostly empirical knowledge. The lectures will be delivered by experts that span a broad range of expertise and backgrounds, including experts from the US Food and Drug Administration, the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the French Institute for Agriculture, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, the French Society for Hospital Hygiene, as well as leading US and French academic institutions. In addition, several speakers from leading US and French companies will make presentations. Thus, this conference will provide participants with an interdisciplinary international forum to exchange knowledge and discuss challenges in multiphase flows pertinent to health problems where fluid dynamics questions are of key importance.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
