Monash University

CReSI Lab

Computational Rheology for Sustainable Industry

Full-stack, multiscale modelling of the rheology and fluid mechanics of complex fluids.

Department of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering · Monash University
What we do

Predicting the flow of complex fluids, from the microstructure up

Complex fluids — polymer solutions, suspensions, slurries, sprays — are everywhere in industry and notoriously hard to predict. Their flow behaviour emerges from a strong two-way coupling between the macroscopic flow and an evolving microstructure, spanning an enormous range of length and time scales.

The CReSI Lab builds models across that whole stack, from the molecular and particle scale up to the continuum flow. Our aim is a full-stack description that connects micromechanics to macroscopic rheology and to process-scale flows, so that the design of sustainable industrial processes for handling complex fluids can rest on predictive computation rather than empiricism. We approach constitutive modelling and non-equilibrium thermodynamics through an information-theoretic lens.

Research

Themes

Constitutive modelling

Tensorial, thixo-elasto-visco-plastic models that capture the coupling between flow and microstructure in viscoelastic and yield-stress fluids.

Microscale simulation

Brownian dynamics of polymers and suspensions, from single molecules to concentrated systems, resolving the physics that sets the rheology.

Free-surface & filament flows

Extensional rheology, liquid bridges, and the stretching and breakup of complex-fluid filaments.

Active matter

The rheology and continuum description of self-propelled particles and active suspensions.

People

The group

Prabhakar Ranganathan
Principal Investigator · Senior Lecturer, Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering, Monash University
Aditya Ganesh
PhD researcher · Extensional-flow dynamics of ring and linear polymers
Meetings & events

Hosted meetings

2025

S4F — Structure, Stress and Strain in Stretching Flows

A workshop bringing together leaders in the field to bridge mesoscale simulation and macroscopic modelling of complex fluids. Monash University Prato Centre, Italy · 18–20 June 2025.

Visit the S4F 2025 site →
Contact

Get in touch

Enquiries, including from prospective students and collaborators, are welcome.

Email: prabhakar.ranganathan@monash.edu
Department: Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering, Monash University