Aerodynamics

Summary

Aerodynamics is the part of fluid dynamics that studies the flow of air, and of gases in general, around moving bodies. Its central questions are the forces that the flow exerts on a body, mainly lift and drag. It asks how they depend on the shape and speed of the body. It ranges from nearly incompressible flow at low speed to compressible flow with shock waves at high speed. Its models, such as potential flow with circulation and boundary layer theory, are classical sources of problems in analysis and numerical mathematics.