In a series of talks in 1946, John von Neumann envisioned the use of high‐speed computers to generate solutions to nonlinear problems, particularly in fluid dynamics. He pointed out that scientists were conducting expensive and difficult experiments to observe physical behavior even when the underlying principles and governing equations were known. “The purpose of the experiment is not to verify a proposed theory but to replace a computation from an unquestioned theory by direct measurements,” he wrote. “Thus wind tunnels are used at present, at least in large part, as computing devices of the so‐called analogy type to integrate the nonlinear partial differential equations of fluid dynamics.”
REFERENCES
1.
H. H. Goldstine, J. von Neumann, in John von Neumann, Collected Works, vol. V, Pergamon, New York (1963), p. 1.
2.
2. For an example, see N. J. Zabusky, PHYSICS TODAY, July 1984, p. 36.
3.
For an impressive compendium of such photographs, see M. Van Dyke, An Album of Fluid Motion, Parabolic, Stanford, Calif. (1982).
4.
K.‐H. A. Winkler, S. W. Hodson, J. W. Chalmers, M. McGowen, D. E. Tolmie, P. R. Woodward, N. J. Zabusky, Cray Channels, Summer 1987, p. 4.
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P. R. Woodward, D. H. Porter, M. Ondrechen, J. Pedelty, K.‐H. A. Winkler, J. W. Chalmers, S. W. Hodson, N. Zabusky, in Proc. Third Int. Symp. on Science and Engineering on Cray Supercomputers, W. Porter, ed., Cray Research Inc, Minneapolis, Minn., in press.
6.
For a detailed discussion of the usefulness of these auxiliary displays, see K.‐H. A. Winkler, M. L. Norman, in Astrophysical Radiation Hydrodynamics, K.‐H. A. Winkler, M. L. Norman, eds., Reidel, Dordrecht, The Netherlands (1986), p. 223.
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P. R. Woodward, in Astrophysical Radiation Hydrodynamics, K.‐H. A. Winkler, M. L. Norman, eds., Reidel, Dordrecht, The Netherlands (1986), p. 245.
10.
Cray Channels, Summer 1987, p. 37.
11.
P. Thompson, in Fundamentals of Human‐Computer Interaction, A. Monk, ed., Academic, New York (1984), p. 5.
12.
K.‐H. A. Winkler, M. L. Norman, J. L. Norton, in Supercomputers: Algorithms, Architectures, and Scientific Computation, F. A. Matsen, T. Tajima, eds., U. of Texas P., Austin (1986), p. 415.
13.
J.‐F. Haas, B. Sturtevant, Interaction of Weak Shock Waves with Cylindrical and Spherical Gas Inhomogeneities, Caltech Graduate Aeronautical Laboratories preprint (March 1987);
J. Fluid Mech., in press.
14.
J. M. Picone, J. P. Boris, Vorticity Generation by Shock Propagation Through Bubbles in a Gas, Naval Research Laboratory preprint (April 1987);
J. Fluid Mech., in press.
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16.
D. L. Book, J. P. Boris, A. L. Kuhl, E. S. Oran, J. M. Picone, S. T. Zalesak, in Proc. Seventh Int. Conf. on Numerical Methods in Fluid Dynamics (Lecture Notes in Physics, vol. 141), W. C. Reynolds, R. W. MacCormack, eds., Springer‐Verlag, Berlin (1981), p. 84.
17.
18.
P. R. Woodward, in Early Solar System Processes, Proc. Int. School of Phys., “Enrico Fermi” course no. 73, D. Lal, ed., Italian Physics Society, Bologna (1980), p. 1.
19.
P. Colella, H. M. Glaz, in Proc. Ninth Int. Conf. on Numerical Methods in Fluid Dynamics (Lecture Notes in Physics, vol. 218), Soubbaramayer, J. P. Boujot, eds., Springer‐Verlag, Berlin (1985), p. 154.
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1987
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