Basics 3 min read
Engineering – A Manifesto
“Engineering is not the handmaiden of physics any more than medicine is of biology” What is science? And how is…
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Basics 9 min read
Risk and failure in complex engineering systems
“We must ensure this never happens again.” This is a common reaction to instances of catastrophic failure. However, in complex…
Uncategorized 14 min read
On Boundary Layers: Laminar, Turbulent and Skin Friction
In the early 20th century, a group of German scientists led by Ludwig Prandtl at the University of Göttingen began studying the fundamental nature…
Basics 5 min read
Antifragility and Aircraft Design
Nassim Nicholas Taleb coined the term “Antifragility” in his book of the same name. Antifragility describes objects that gain from random perturbations, i.e.…
Basics 6 min read
NASA Langley Research Center
Earlier this year, I had the privilege of working on a research project at NASA’s Langley Research Centre. Apart from…
Basics 9 min read
Three essential engineering skills and the state of modern technology
John Partridge is the founder of the deap-sea instrumentation company Sonardyne, and also graduated from the University of Bristol, my…
Basics 32 min read
The History of Rocket Science
Rocket technology has evolved for more than 2000 years. Today’s rockets are a product of a long tradition of ingenuity…
Basics 9 min read
Dimensional Analysis: From Atomic Bombs to Wind Tunnel Testing
Despite the growing computer power and increasing sophistication of computational models, any design meant operate in the real world requires…
Basics 5 min read
The von Kármán Vortex Street and Tacoma Narrows Disaster
On November 8, 1940 newspapers across America opened with the headline “TACOMA NARROWS BRIDGE COLLAPSES”. The headline caught the eye…
Basics 5 min read
The Birth of the Jet: The Engine that Shrunk the World
In today’s time it is easy to take for granted the complex inventions that alleviate our everyday life. The modern…