Michael Kirkpatrick

Associate Professor Michael Kirkpatrick is affiliated with the School of Aerospace, Mechanical and Mechatronic Engineering in the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Sydney, where he also serves as Director of Information & Communication Technologies. He graduated with a Bachelor of Engineering in Mechanical Engineering (BE Mech) from the University of Sydney in 1996 and subsequently worked with the international consultancy Ove Arup & Partners in their Sydney and London offices. In 1998, he returned to the University of Sydney to pursue a PhD, which he completed in 2002. Following his doctorate, Kirkpatrick was awarded a two-year Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Center for Turbulence Research, Stanford University, in collaboration with NASA Ames, from 2002 to 2004. He then took up a lecturing position in the School of Engineering at the University of Tasmania in 2004, before rejoining the University of Sydney in 2006, where he has progressed to his current role as Associate Professor in Fluids, Energy and Environment.

Kirkpatrick's research specializes in buoyancy-affected flows in rivers, lakes, estuaries, and coastal oceans, utilizing direct numerical simulation (DNS) and large eddy simulation (LES). His work addresses thermal stratification caused by solar heating, which leads to environmental issues such as algal blooms, mass fish deaths, and ecosystem damage due to insufficient mixing and oxygenation. He develops advanced mathematical river-simulation models to predict water quality responses to weather, climate, and flow-rate changes, aiding better management of Australia's waterways. Employing computational fluid dynamics (CFD) techniques and the PUFFIN simulation code, his studies extend to plume transport in turbulent urban flows and real-time dispersion modeling. Key publications include "Direct numerical simulation of 'fountain filling box' flow with a confined weak laminar plane fountain" (Dong et al., Heat Transfer, 2023), "Effect of Thermal Stratification in Meandering Turbulent Open-Channel Flow with Varying Sinuosity" (Nguyen et al., Journal of Hydraulic Engineering, 2023), "Amplification of turbulence by sharp meanders on thermally stratified open channel flow" (Nguyen & Kirkpatrick, International Journal of Heat and Fluid Flow, 2022), "Destratification of thermally stratified turbulent open-channel flow by surface cooling" (Kirkpatrick et al., Journal of Fluid Mechanics, 2020), and "Evolution of thermally stratified turbulent open channel flow after removal of the heat source" (Kirkpatrick et al., 2019). He teaches undergraduate and postgraduate courses in Fluid Mechanics, Thermal Engineering & Environment, and Renewable Energy, and supervises PhD students on plume transport and dispersion models. His scholarly output has accumulated over 1,000 citations.

Professional Email: michael.kirkpatrick@sydney.edu.au