W. R. Dean

W. R. Dean was a British applied mathematician and fluid dynamicist. His research interests included Stokes flow, solid mechanics, and flow in curved channels. The Dean number bears his name.

Dean carried out pioneering work in the study of fluid flow at low Reynolds numbers, by applying methods from elasticity theory. Some of his more famous results include solutions for secondary flow in curved tubes, for the perturbation to shear flow near a wall cased by a gap in the wall, and for flow in a corner.Binnie, A. M. (1978) doi-inline|10.1146/annurev.fl.10.010178.000245|Some Notes on the Study of Fluid Mechanics in Cambridge, England, "Annual Review of Fluid Mechanics", 10, 1–11.]

Dean was an undergraduate at Trinity College, Cambridge. He spent five years at Imperial College was later a fellow of Trinity College. During the war he undertook mathematical work as part of the "Anti-Aircraft Experimental Section of M.I.D." [Milne, E. A. (1945) Ralph Howard Fowler. 1889-1944, "Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society", 5, 60–78.] He also held the Goldsmid Chair in Applied Mathematics at University College London (from which he retired in 1964), [Lighthill, J. (1985) [http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0080-4606%28198511%2931%3C544%3AKS2S1M%3E2.0.CO%3B2-L Keith Stewartson: 20 September 1925 – 7 May 1983] , "Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society", 31, 544–569.] and a chair at the University of Arizona.

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