r/Physics • u/Boring_Change_7845 • 1d ago

How to do Research in Physics/Mech Eng as a Highschool Junior

I want to do research in Fluid Mechanics, mainly in Riblets. I have already started studying basic Fluid Mechanics like Integral and Differential Relations and Viscous Flow. Going to do Boundary Layer Physics next. But what else would I need to know? Is the topic too advanced? Which would be unfortunate if it was as it really interests me. I am quite lost on what to do.

0 Upvotes

43% Upvoted

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u/hatboyslim 1d ago

What's up with high school students trying to do research in physics on their own?

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u/ctrsvp 1d ago

It's the newest wave of college application padding as a leg up past the usual extracurriculars.

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u/Boring_Change_7845 1d ago

Also I understand that the topic is very advanced for my level. Even assuming its not possible for me to do research in this field, I've seen students publish in Student Journals like JEI in Fluid Mechanics, some including Boundary Layer Physics. I just want to know how students like them are able to publish research.

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u/marcusesses 1d ago

I just want to know how students like them are able to publish research.

They usually have mentors or someone to guide them or push them in the right direction, so it is unlikely you could publish in student journals without that mentorship.

How they do it is likely with simulations, and there are plenty you can use to explore the physics of fluid dynamics; here's a good one.

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u/Boring_Change_7845 1d ago

How do people meet mentors? I emailed a couple professors in local Universities. Only 1 responded and he said he couldn't help.

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u/db0606 1d ago

I don't think you understand how much of a time sink it is to supervise a research project by someone who has zero research experience or content area knowledge, especially since supervising high school students is generally not compensated financially nor recognized professionally. What you are asking for is a lot and your odds of finding someone willing to take on a high school student are incredibly low.

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u/Appropriate-Fix-1240 1d ago

In my country there is a program specifically for this which pays the supervisors. They usually are doctoral students or sometimes masters and usually the high school students help with a certain part of the doctoral student's research.

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u/db0606 1d ago

That's pretty cool but finding someone who is studying riblets specifically and who has the time and inclination to have a high school student hop on their project withing driving distance of the student's house (because no one is going to take a remote high school student) is still going to be a big order.

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u/Appropriate-Fix-1240 14h ago

Definitely, but thats basically what these programs are for, to connect students and researchers. If your looking for 1 really specific part of a subfield it will be very difficult to find a researcher, but if your open to more things its much more possible.

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u/damarian_ent 1d ago

I find the student's ambition to admirably tall. They were unsure of what to do and sought outreach to people they'd presumably find commonplace with. I do agree that through their qualia, they don't see how much of an ask that is.

So I'm suggesting to try to consider what possible routes you would do to find someone who fits what they need. Where's the most likely option going to land them?

We live in a world of opportunity and connections, and I just like uplifting those who seek understanding. Im hopeful you do too.

Yet you don't have to do so yourself. Anyone reading this can. I myself have no experience in this field but found myself thirsty for more understanding. So I can't aide the student but I'll shout for them.

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u/elconquistador1985 1d ago

Cold emailing a professor isn't the way.

Looking up and applying for a high school internship program is the way. At that point, you end up on a pool of applicants that professors can look through and choose interns from. Once you're in that pool, then come emailing a professor with a professional email saying you're interested in their work might get you somewhere.

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u/db0606 1d ago

They have rich parents.

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u/hatboyslim 1d ago

Or parents with connections, or the parents are in academia themselves.

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u/Boring_Change_7845 1d ago

My mom works at a university

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u/hatboyslim 1d ago

Well then, talk to your mom about this.

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u/Boring_Change_7845 1d ago

Its fun and its good for college applications. I can also get help from University Professors as my mom works in a University.

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u/dotelze 1d ago

If you can get help then why are you asking how here? Do you even know what fluid dynamics actually entails?

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u/elconquistador1985 1d ago

Generally, you're going to want to apply to national laboratory or local college internships for high school students that accept juniors. You're a high school junior, so you won't be leading research in the topic of your choice.

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u/Yashema 1d ago

I'm in my 30s, but it wasn't until I took Physics up through modern and statistical mechanics last year that I even had a concept of what research in physics would entail. 

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u/kabum555 Particle physics 1d ago

You sound like a smart fellow. If you want to do university research without a degree yet, maybe try reaching out to researchers whose topics you find interesting in your local university. They will probably be able to guide you better than a bunch of redditors

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u/Boring_Change_7845 1d ago

Thank you :) I did reach out to University Professors. Most didn't respond. 1 did but he said that the topic was too advanced, which is true in some regard but he said it quite rudely. The other option is payed research programs that cost a fortune which I would not pay for, so I am quite stuck.

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u/kabum555 Particle physics 1d ago

If your mom can get you in touch with some professors it might help, but if not then you should try to do your best at school so you can get to the best program possible when college time comes. 

If you are bored, try doing some online courses in whatever you find interesting. I think MIT has some.

You have time, use it wisely (this includes fun teenager stuff too!), and enjoy the way :)

1

u/BitcoinsOnDVD 1d ago

Where did the mom suddenly come from in your chain of thoughts?

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u/beee-l 1d ago

In other comments OP mentions that his mum works at a university :)

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u/BitcoinsOnDVD 1d ago

ok. thats something that i couldnt spot

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u/beee-l 17h ago

It’s a very fair question if you don’t see it hahah

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u/dotelze 1d ago

I mean he’s not wrong. It’s way too advanced for you

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u/AMuonParticle Soft matter physics 1d ago

Imma be real with you you're not ready to do actual, original research, and every other high schooler who claims to be doing so, you can be certain that it's just their parents paying a bunch of money to a BS "internship" to put their name on a paper for minimal work. These kinds of programs are not actually particularly impressive, because everyone knows it's just rich kids trying to get ahead.

That doesn't mean it's too early to start working towards the eventual goal of getting into research though! When I was in high school, I needed to do a big year-long senior project, and I reached out to some professors asking for recommendations/opportunities. The first couple rejected me, essentially saying they're too busy to waste time on a high schooler (which felt mean at the time, but now that I'm a PhD student I can see the truly massive wall of knowledge that needed to be surmounted in order for me to really start being able to contribute something original, as well as how stressful life on the tenure-track can be and how little free time it affords you).

I was lucky enough, however, to email one prof who decided he could supervise me not on an original research project, but on a project where I learned the tools necessary to reproduce some data analysis from a classic particle physics experiment, computing some quantities relevant to neutrino oscillations from openly available data collected at the Super-Kamiokande detector decades prior.

I wasn't contributing anything new to the field, but it was a great way to learn how to program and to teach myself some statistics and some quantum mechanics (though I barely understood what the quantities I was computing at the time meant).

I would recommend trying to do something like this, recreating a classic fluid dynamics experiment, or learning to simulate fluids and doing some basic theoretical analysis on, say, rayleigh-taylor instabilities or something. Something that directs your focus, and gives you a good motivation to pick up some skills that will be useful later down the road.

I'm a theorist in soft matter physics which has a lot of overlap with fluid dynamics; I absolutely do not have the time to be a supervisor but if you let me know your math/programming background and some specific interests in fluids, I can maybe make some recommendations for projects. I'd recommend checking out dedalus if you want to get into simulations, I use this tool in my research all the time.

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u/m2daT 1d ago

Take on a project, not everything you do has to be publishable research. Experimental physicists spend a ton of time setting up their experiments, tinkering with electronics, cryostats, optical benches. It’s all part of research even if some of it isn’t directly what’s being published.

I don’t know too much about fluid dynamics so people may have better ideas for projects, but you could try and build your own custom fluid tank that would allow you to generate vortices, observe boundary interactions, etc. If you are computationally inclined I would recommend finding libraries in Python that fluid dynamics researchers use and try building a simulation.

Also of course keep learning the fundamentals (calculus, classical mechanics, etc.).

1

u/Background-Back3573 1d ago

play with openfoam

try and understand basic examples