Luc Deike
May 5, 2023
Julia Schwarz
Luc Deike, an expert in fluid dynamics, has been awarded a grant from the earth sciences division of NASA for work on the remote sensing of ocean currents and winds.
Deike, assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering and the High Meadows Environmental Institute, studies fundamental fluid dynamics, exploring the physics of waves, drops and bubbles in a turbulent environment.
The grant is awarded by NASA’s ocean vector wind science team and includes $800,000 in funding over the next four years. The goal of the project, High Fidelity Modeling of Parasitic Capillary Wave Dynamics for Remote Sensing, is to improve remote sensing of ocean currents and winds by satellites. The research will focus on understanding the physics of sea surface roughness, particularly the interaction between wave amplitude and wind speed, to improve the accuracy of remote observations.
The research is a collaboration between Deike and J. Thomas Farrar, Senior Scientist at the Woods Hole Institute of Oceanography. Previous research that motivated this proposal was done by Jiarong Wu, a fifth-year graduate student in MAE.
Observing and interpreting winds over the ocean is a longstanding research area at NASA, and has led to multiple discoveries in ocean and atmospheric physics and air-sea interaction. These discoveries have had many impacts, including improved forecasting of extreme weather events like hurricanes and better understanding of how oceans impact climate change.
“This contribution to Earth observations and remote sensing is part of MAE’s efforts to impact space science and engineering towards improved understanding of climate and environmental processes,” said Howard Stone, Donald R. Dixon ’69 and Elizabeth W. Dixon Professor and chair of MAE.
Deike joined the Princeton faculty in 2017, after three years as a postdoctoral researcher at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego. His work has been recognized by the National Science Foundation and the American Chemical Society. He is an affiliated faculty member in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and the Princeton Materials Institute. Deike completed a doctoral degree at the Université Paris Diderot, a master’s degree at Université Pierre et Marie Curie, and a bachelor’s degree at École Normale Supérieure, all in France.