Sponsors

Dominique Morvan, Emeritus Professor at the Aix-Marseille University, France

 

Short Biography: Dominique Morvan is an Emeritus Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Aix-Marseille University (AMU) and a researcher at the M2P2 Laboratory (Mechanics, Modeling and Clean Processes). After earning his PhD in Mathematics and Fluid Mechanics in 1985, he spent fifteen years as a researcher at the CNRS before becoming a Full Professor in 2000. He has held significant leadership roles within the academic community, notably serving as the Director of the Department of Mechanics at the Faculty of Sciences from 2014 to 2021. His extensive research career has evolved from biomechanics and liquid metal heat transfer to a primary focus on fire physics and wildfire modeling since 1998. A prolific contributor to the field, Professor Morvan has authored over 70 international publications and 230 conference communications, while also serving as an Associate Editor for the International Journal of Wildland Fire. He has been a key participant in numerous high-profile European research programs, including Eufirelab and Fireparadox, solidifying his reputation as a leading expert in the physical simulation of fire behavior.

Short summary: Forest fire is a very complex and multi-scale problem. During a long period, this problem has been approached experimentally and in associating empirical or semi-empirical models. Even if this method has known some success, many limitations have also been identified. One of those was the impossibility to generalize the results obtained for particular conditions to other more general situations. With the increase of power of computation means, new opportunities coming from fluid mechanics and fire physics have participated to propose new reflexions and analysis concerning the basic mechanisms governing wildfire behaviour. This is this story that I propose to present in this conference.