ABSTRACT
ABSTRACT: This paper highlights some of the scientific and engineering contributions of Prof. Gerhard H. Jirka. In broad terms, his life’s work related to contributions to and the formation of the field of Environmental Fluid Mechanics. We review three major areas of his achievements here, beginning with his work on jets and plumes and their related integral methods, resulting in the development of the CORMIX model for evaluating the fluid mechanical performance and dilution characteristics of pollutant and waste heat discharges. Second, his studies on gas transfer at the air-water interface are discussed, demonstrating his ability to combine findings from experiments with theory and to cover a wide range of topics, from fundamental studies of the detailed phenomena to the development of methods for solving practical engineering problems. A third area strongly influenced by his recent work is shallow flows, wherefrom significant results on shallow turbulent wake flows, shallow vortex dynamics, and groyne field flows will be presented here as a few examples.
