Vortex-Induced Vibration of Soft Corals for Improved Food Capture - SICB talk

Sea plume Antillogorgia bipinnata is a soft coral species endemic to the Caribbean Sea, which forms arborescent colonies. On the sea floor, a whole colony of A. bipinnata sways back and forth at the low frequency of surface wave action, while its branches exhibit a peculiar motion vibrating at high frequency transverse to the flow. In this presentation, we investigate the nature of these unreported high frequency vibrations and hypothesise on their biological implication with regards to food interception. We use computational fluid dynamics to simulate the particle interception of fixed cylinders and spring-mounted cylinders. We find that vibrating cylinders can capture up to 40% more particles than fixed ones when the frequency of the vortices shed in the wake of the cylinder matches with the natural frequency of the spring mounted cylinder. Whereas engineers have developed numerous inventions to prevent chimney stacks, risers, and other structures from vibrating due to vortex shedding; our results indicate that soft corals potentially benefit from this same phenomenon. Vortex-induced vibrations allow coral to sweep more water and possibly capture more food particles. Our theoretical results open the door for field and lab experiments for validation, and they provide another example of how natural structures differ from engineer-made ones.
Presentation page at SICB:
sicbannualmeeting.pathable.co...
Learn more by reading Mouad's papers
Boudina, M., Gosselin, F.P., Étienne, S. “Vortex-induced vibrations: a soft coral feeding strategy?” Journal of Fluid Mechanics, 2021, 916, A50.
doi.org/10.1017/jfm.2021.252
arxiv.org/abs/2009.11764
Boudina, M., Gosselin, F.P., Étienne, S. “Direct interception or inertial impaction? A theoretical derivation of the efficiency power law for a simple and practical definition of capture modes” Physics of Fluids, 2020, 32, 123603
doi.org/10.1063/5.0030891
arxiv.org/abs/2011.06359v1

[@sudhanshumaurya2860]

Nice work

[@user-ne2nf8dw1b]

great

[@adnansaifan7977]

Nice work!

[@souravkanthal2796]

just awesome research.

[@corentin4094]

Tu mérites tellement plus de vues, c'est tellement intéressant !!!

[@FrederickGosselin]

Oh merci beaucoup !

[@soroushasadian9100]

It is fascinating that corals can take advantage of this phenomenon to absorb more food, but could we take advantage as well?
Before watching this video, I knew that VIV is detrimental to industries, but now we can find applications to benefit VIV, especially in absorbing materials from the ambient. The first thing that came to my mind was water harvesting from the moist air.
I enjoyed this video, thank you for your thorough study.