Particle Image Velocimetry near Interfaces: A Moving Future

Abstract

Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) has become a standardized measurement technique in the field of experimental research both in academic and industrial environments with applications covering the breadth of fluid dynamics. The metrology's success must be ascribed to its non-intrusive nature together with its intrinsic simplicity and ability to retrieve vast amounts of instantaneous spatial velocity information (order of giga-to terabytes) relative to the short operation time (order of seconds). While the majority of PIV image processing related studies have been aimed so far at improving the accuracy of the fluid velocities extraction, PIV image analysis involving arbitrarily moving bodies has received limited to no attention. Notwithstanding, it is expected that great advances can be made in the field of fluid-structure interactions by improving the technique's measurement capabilities as a direct result of enhanced image analyses.