About Ludwig Prandtl
Ludwig Prandtl (German pronunciation: [ˈluːtvɪç ˈpʁantl̩]; 4 February 1875 – 15 August 1953) was a German fluid dynamicist, physicist and aerospace scientist. He was a pioneer in the development of rigorous systematic mathematical analyses which he used for underlying the science of aerodynamics, which have come to form the basis of the applied science of aeronautical engineering. In the 1920s, he developed the mathematical basis for the fundamental principles of subsonic aerodynamics in particular; and in general up to and including transonic velocities. His studies identified the boundary layer, thin-airfoils, and lifting-line theories. The Prandtl number was named after him. Due to similar reasons to Prandtl's 1904 paper, these first 7 papers on the boundary layer would be slow to spread outside of Gottingen. While working there, he discovered that the suction tube did not work because the lines of flow separated from the walls of the tube, so the expected pressure rise in the sharply-divergent tube never occurred. In 1901 Prandtl became a professor of fluid mechanics at the technical school in Hannover, later the Technical University Hannover and then the University of Hannover.
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