People
We are looking to grow! If you are interested in joining us, please take a look at our research and our publications for more details. Applications by women and underrepresented minorities are specifically encouraged.
PhD openings on physics and modeling of wall-bounded turbulent flows for external aerodynamic applications. Prospective graduate students should apply directly to Caltech Galcit / MIT AeroAstro, not to my email.
Undergraduate students looking for research opportunities can email adrianld@caltech.edu or adrianld@mit.edu with their interests and any relevant coursework or research experience.
*Due to the high volume of emails, I might be slow in responding, but I eventually will get back to you! I appreciate your patience.
Faculty
Adrian Lozano-Duran
Adrian is an Associate Professor at the Graduate Aerospace Laboratories at Caltech and a Visiting Associate Professor at MIT AeroAstro. The overarching theme of his research is fluid dynamics, with an emphasis on turbulence through theory, numerical simulation, and experiments. His work includes causal inference, reduced-order modeling, and control of turbulence using information theory. He is also interested in machine-learning closure models for computational fluid dynamics, specifically oriented towards aerospace applications ranging from low-speed aerodynamics to supersonic and hypersonic flows.
Graduate Students
Yuenong Ling
Yuenong is a fourth-year graduate student in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT. He received a B.S. in Engineering Physics from the University of Michigan and a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Shanghai Jiaotong University in 2021. His research topics include causality and turbulence modeling. He loves all kinds of sports, especially soccer and college football.
email | CV | google scholar
Yuan Yuan
Yuan is a graduate student starting fall 2022 in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT. She received a B.S. in Aeronautics and Astronautics Engineering from Shanghai Jiao Tong University in May 2022. She is interested in data-driven modeling of turbulence. She enjoys music and sports in her spare time.
Julian Powers
Julian is a second-year graduate student in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT. He recieved a B.S. in Aeronautics and Astronautics Engineering from MIT in 2023. He is interested in particle image velocimetry for analyzing flow separation. He also enjoys playing chess and running.
Álvaro Martínez-Sánchez
Álvaro is a second-year graduate student in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT. He received a B.S. in Aerospace Engineering from the Polytechnic University of Valencia in 2021 and a M.S. in Aerospace Engineering with a major in Advanced Aerodynamics from ISAE-SUPAERO, University of Toulouse, in 2023. His research topics include information theory, causality and flow control. Outside of work, he enjoys playing squash and going swimming and hiking.
Brad Roberts
Brad is a third-year PhD student in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at MIT. He hails from western Canada and received BSc and MSc degrees in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Alberta. His doctoral research is focused on the implementation of quantum algorithms for computational fluid dynamics. Outside of research, he loves playing sports and being physically active, being outdoors, and trying new things.
Tim Hoogenraad
Tim Hoogenraad is a first-year graduate student in the Mechanical Engineering Department at MIT. He is originally from The Netherlands and received a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley in 2022. He has previous experience using FEM and DEM in the biotech industry and is now working on the combination of grid refinement and data-driven turbulence modeling. His hobbies include cycling, 3D printing, and hiking with his two golden retrievers.
Tristan Villanueva (NSF Graduate Fellow and GEM Fellow)
Tristan is a second-year graduate student in the Mechanical Engineering department at Caltech. He received a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from UC Berkeley in 2023 and studied a semester at Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM). His research interests include control, dynamical systems, and information theory. In his free time he enjoys running, climbing, and doing outreach in the LA and Caltech communities.
Adrian Anton-Alvarez
Adrián is a second-year graduate student at the Graduate Aerospace Laboratories at Caltech. He received a BSc in Aerospace Engineering from Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, a MSc in Aerodynamics from TU Delft and MSc in Aeronautics from Caltech. His research interests include compressible aerodynamics, turbulence modeling and numerical methods. In his free time he enjoys swimming and playing chess.
Postdocs
Gonzalo Arranz
Gonzalo Arranz is a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT. He received his PhD in Fluid Mechanics from Universidad Carlos III of Madrid in 2021. His research is focused on external aerodynamics by means of numerical simulations. He is also interested in wall-bounded turbulence modeling and control. In his spare time, he enjoys reading, playing bass and swimming.
Rong Ma
Rong Ma is a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT. She got her PhD at the Department of Aerospace Engineering and Mechanics from University of Minnesota in 2022. Her research is focused on developing wall model LES accounting for roughness. She is also interested in quantifying sensitivity using causality tools. She enjoys playing the violin and traveling in her spare time.
Imran Hayat
Imran Hayat is a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT. He received his PhD in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Pennsylvania in 2024. His research is focused on developing turbulence models for LES of nonequilibrium flows, with an emphasis on data-driven modeling techniques. In his spare time, he enjoys playing Rubab and watching cricket.
Lingbo Ji
Lingbo Ji is a postdoctoral researcher in the Aerospace Department at Caltech. She received her PhD in Mechanical Engineering from MIT in 2024. Her research is focused on three-dimensional numerical simulations of vortex dynamics problems. She is also interested in sensitivity analysis of vortical flows. She enjoys reading, sports, and traveling in her spare time.
Visting Students
Timur Uyumaz
Timur is an undergraduate student in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics exchanging this year from Imperial College London. His research involves numerical simulations of wall-bounded turbulence and the examination of coherent structures, and has further interests in chaos theory and optimisation. Tennis and brazilian jiu-jitsu are his favourite ways to start and end the day, and he has thoroughly enjoyed hiking trips to the White Mountains with MIT’s Outing Club.
Past Members
Blanca Fuentes-Monjas
Blanca was a second-year MSc student at ETH Zurich. She received her BSc in Aerospace Engineering from Universidad Carlos III de Madrid and completed her BSc thesis at Delft University of Technology. Her research focused on grid refinement for wall-bounded turbulent flows. She enjoys running, participating in various sports, and playing the violin.
Sam Costa
m was a first-year master’s student in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics. His research interests included turbulence modeling, external aerodynamics, and numerical methods. He was also on the varsity rowing team and enjoyed reading, cycling, cooking, and solving crossword puzzles in his spare time.
Adam A. Sliwiak
Adam was a postdoctoral associate in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT until 2024. He completed his PhD in Computational Science and Engineering at MIT, advised by Qiqi Wang. The goal of his research was the development of advanced computational tools for applied analysis and prediction of chaotic systems and turbulent flows. His fundamental studies were based on dynamical systems theory, information theory, and numerical analysis. In his spare time, Adam enjoys learning history, theology, and philosophy. He is also an avid gamer.
Emily Williams (DOE Computational Science Graduate Fellow)
Emily was a graduate student in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT. Her research focused on using novel methods for computational fluid dynamics of turbulent flows for external aerodynamic applications. Before attending MIT, she earned her B.S. in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2021. Outside of work, she enjoyed rock climbing and walking around Cambridge and Boston.
email | CV | google scholar
Ichraq Bedraoui (Visiting student)
Ichraq Bedraoui was a Master’s student in the Department of Mechanics at École Polytechnique in France. Her research interests included turbulence modeling, propulsion, and computational fluid dynamics. Her research project aimed to identify the flow structures over an airfoil responsible for the far-field sources of noise using wall-modeled large eddy simulation and causal modal decomposition. In her spare time, she enjoyed building aircraft models and painting.
Argyrios Apostolidis (Visiting student)
Argyris was a final-year PhD student at Laboratoire de Mécanique des Fluides de Lille (LMFL). He held an MEng in Mechanical Engineering from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and an MSc in Advanced Computational Methods in Aeronautics from Imperial College London. His research interests included wall turbulence, turbulence energy transfer, and the dynamics of coherent structures. In his leisure time, he enjoyed playing basketball and rock climbing.
Grace Mao (UROP Student)
Grace was a third-year undergraduate student in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT. Her research interests included computational fluid dynamics for turbulence modeling. Her project focused on using high-performance computing to run wall-modeled large-eddy simulations of the X-59 supersonic aircraft. Outside of school, she was on the varsity sailing team and enjoyed swimming.
