Lately, I have been examining the entire history of hypersonics research and technology, with a particular focus on the re-entry problem and ablation for small vehicles, such as those from ballistic missiles. While reviewing the writings of Wernher von Braun, I was amused to find that he joked about using frozen balsa wood as a …
Author Archives: saemiller
Words and Virginia Woolf
Finally, and most emphatically, words, like ourselves, in order to live at their ease, need privacy. Undoubtedly they like us to think, and they like us to feel, before we use them; but they also like us to pause; to become unconscious. Our unconsciousness is their privacy; our darkness is their light… That pause was …
Kelly Johnson on X-Plane Programs
Our present research airplanes have developed startling performance only by the use of rocket engines and flying essentially in a vacuum. Testing airplanes designed for transonic flight speeds at Mach numbers between 2 and 3 has proven, mainly, the bravery of the test pilots and the fact that where there is no drag, the rocket …
Navier-Stokes Equations and Practicality
Because an effort is likely impossible and impractical does not mean it is not worth attempting. The Navier-Stokes equations and turbulent flow represent the last great classical problem in physics. Since the time of Leonard Euler and Jean-Baptiste le Rond d’Alembert, many have devoted much of their lives to working on these problems. Although they …
Eight Years at Florida
It has now been eight years since I joined the University of Florida. Years ago, the University was a very different place. Many things have changed due to external and internal factors. One thing is for certain: I am told that the academic community and academics are always changing. To be a successful professor, much …
Deming and Statistics
In God we trust. All others must bring data. — W. Edwards Deming Deming revolutionized quality management with his emphasis on data-driven decision-making. His 1950s lectures on Statistical Product Quality Administration in Japan were instrumental in Japan’s post-war economic growth, helping it become the world’s second-largest economy. Deming was awarded the National Medal of Technology …
Madame Rousseau on d’Alembert
You will never be anything but a philosopher – and what is that but an ass who plagues himself all his life, that he may be talked about after he is dead. ~ Madame Rousseau on d’Alembert
On Websites at Florida
I have moved my faculty website to this website. My personal and faculty website are now located and combined here at saemiller.com. There is a redirect from https://faculty.eng.ufl.edu/fluids/ The university depends on academic freedom, and academic freedom depends on tenure. Without tenure there is no academic freedom, and without academic freedom there is no university.
Professor Chung and the NASA Public Service Medal
My senior colleague, Professor J. Chung, won the NASA Exceptional Public Service Medal. Amazing. https://news.yahoo.com/news/nasa-awards-uf-professor-exceptional-192254541.html
Gödel and Time
$\mathrm{LL}$ cosmological solutions with non-vanishing density of matter known at present ${ }^1$ have the common property that, in a certain sense, they contain an “absolute” time coordinate, ${ }^2$ owing to the fact that there exists a one-parametric system of three-spaces everywhere orthogonal on the world lines of matter. It is easily seen that …