Todd Squires Email & Phone Number

My teaching and research interests center on the dynamics and processes of soft materials and complex fluids. Broadly, I am interested in how to understand, troubleshoot, and design multifunctional, multicomponent complex fluids — as performed by living organisms as well as a wide range of industries (consumer products, cosmetics and foods; pharmaceuticals; energy (oil, gas, mineral and electrochemical); materials, coatings and sprays, and the precursors used to process and manufacture almost everything…) Although toothpaste, drilling muds, and oven cleaners might seem to have little in common, they all employ analogous ‘building blocks’ to achieve similar mechanical and flow properties, for related reasons. Our laboratory has developed new techniques to study complex fluids, including microfluidic systems that ‘sculpt’ chemical microenvironments in space and time; interferometric visualization of diffusing and reacting solutes; and sensitive probes of the interfacial rheology and surface pressure of surfactant monolayers. Current research thrusts include (i) “soluto-inertial” strategies to design and exploit long-range, non-equilibrium interactions between suspended particles and drops; (ii) interfacial polymerization reactions; (iii) the mechanical properties of aging asphaltene films(iv) function and dysfunction of lung surfactant monolayers; (v) solute adsorption and diffusion in ionic liquids, hydrogels, and soft matter systems(vi) dynamics and collapse of microgel suspensions.

Listed skills include Chemical Engineering, Fluid Mechanics, Complex Fluids, Formulation, and 5 others.