Is ideal fluid flow around an airfoil the Lambert W function?

[swampwiz]

NOTE: By "ideal", I mean incompressible & inviscid (the forum doesn't allow a long enough title).

I was looking at this Wikipedia article, and the graph of this function struck me as looking exactly like ideal fluid flow around an object.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lambert_W_function

EDIT: OK, I continued reading the article, and indeed, this function seems to be used for flow around a smooth object of any viscosity. Is there any good article that delves into this further?

 

[Achy47]

Thank you for your observation and interest in ideal fluid flow. The Lambert W function is indeed commonly used in the study of fluid dynamics, particularly in the analysis of potential flow around objects. This function is related to the stream function, which is a mathematical representation of the velocity field in a fluid. In the case of ideal fluid flow, the stream function satisfies the Laplace equation, which is the same equation that the Lambert W function satisfies.

In terms of further reading, I would recommend looking into the literature on potential flow theory, which delves into the mathematical principles and applications of ideal fluid flow. Some good resources to start with are "Potential Flow Theory" by L.M. Milne-Thomson and "Introduction to Theoretical and Computational Fluid Dynamics" by C. Pozrikidis.

Additionally, there are many research papers and articles that use the Lambert W function in the analysis of fluid flow, so a search on a scientific database such as Google Scholar or Scopus may also yield relevant results.

I hope this helps in your understanding of ideal fluid flow and its connection to the Lambert W function. Happy reading!