This Research Planning Grant will enable Dr Angelika Rigos to initiate a research program studying the effect of hydrodynamic interactions on the behavior of colloidal suspensions. Many body hydrodynamic interactions will be included in model studies of hydrodymaic through the use of simulation methods. Much of the early work will entail making the simulations more efficient so that enough experimentation can be accomplished to determine realistic models to treat sheared colloidal suspensions. Subsequent work will entail validating the results through the comparison to experiment. %%% Research Planning Grants are awarded to women who have not yet received federal funding for their research. Dr. Rigos will be initiating a program which involves computer modelling and simulations on the very complex problem of the flow of colloidal suspensions. This work is of considerable importance to the understanding of the transport of materials in the environment.