Dr Katarzyna Kowal

Lecturer in Applied Mathematics, The University of Glasgow

Dr Katarzyna Kowal is an applied mathematician interested in the mathematical modelling and analysis of a broad range of industrial, environmental and geophysical processes involving fluid mechanics and/or phase change. She is based at the University of Glasgow, where she is a lecturer of applied mathematics. Prior to this, she held a research fellowship at Trinity College, Cambridge and was based at the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics (DAMTP) at the University of Cambridge, following a postdoctoral fellowship at Northwestern University in the USA. She completed her PhD, MMath, and BA degrees in applied mathematics at the University of Cambridge. 

Katarzyna’s research can be classified into a number of themes involving the application of viscous fluid mechanics and/or flows involving phase change. These include thin-film flows, flows over deformable substrates and/or roughness, sliding and surface slip, fluid-structure interaction, flow in porous media, viscous fingering, thermocapillary convection and rapid solidification of fluids. Applications of her work have so far included the large-scale dynamics of ice sheets and their basal lubrication, the fluid mechanics of additive manufacturing or 3D printing, including the onset of thermocapillary convection in laser melt pools and its effects on morphological instabilities in the rapid solidification of binary alloys, as well as pharmacological applications. She is always on the lookout for further applications and possible new collaborations, so please do get in touch if any ideas come to mind.