About Me
Hello, I am Herman Mak (麥翰文).
I am currently a PhD candidate in theoretical and numerical fluid mechanics and aeroelasticity at École polytechnique and ONERA - The French Aerospace Lab. I am deeply interested in uncovering the fascinating secrets of turbulence, aerodynamics, and their interaction with transportation (ground/air/space), renewable energy infrastructure, or any other parts of our built environment. I also have a wider interest in anything physics, engineering, mathematics, technology, and scientific communication/teaching. Moreover, I am highly trained in my degrees not only in aerospace engineering and fluid mechanics, but also in research, data analysis, communication, collaboration, and critical, creative, interdisciplinary thinking. Please find below a short overview of my education and experience so far, or alternatively view my full CV here.
Other Skills
MS Office/iWorks (incl. Excel)
PhD in Fluid Mechanics
École polytechnique & ONERA - The French Aerospace Lab
11/2021 — 11/2024
I am currently pursuing a PhD in theoretical and numerical fluid mechanics and aeroelasticity on the Improvement of Aeroelastic Models for Linear Gust Response Prediction for aerofoils in subsonic and supersonic flow using resolvent analysis. This project will be co-supervised by Dr Olivier Marquet (ONERA-DAAA), Dr Johann Moulin (ONERA-DAAA), and Dr Lutz Lesshafft (École polytechnique-LadHyX), and is partly funded by Airbus and ONERA.
MSc Advanced Aeronautical Engineering
Imperial College London
10/2020 — 10/2021
I am on course for a Distinction after having completed modules on a broad range of topics related to aeronautical engineering including aerodynamics (including turbulence, flow control, aeroservoelasicity, compressible flows, and Computational Fluid Dynamics), structural dynamics, control theory, AI, spaceflight mechanics, aircraft design, and airworthiness.
Furthermore, I completed a research project to predict the net drag reduction that can be achieved by positioning an undulating sinusoidal wavy wall at an oblique angle to the flow direction to emulate spanwise forcing; this idea was first proposed by my supervisor in Chernyshenko (2013).
BA&Sc How do fluids affect vehicles?
Quest University Canada
09/2016 — 05/2020
At Quest, after completing a set of foundation courses, each student chooses a Question to focus their third and fourth years. I chose investigated the above Question "How do fluids affect vehicles?" To this end, I self studied fluid dynamics, took classes in physics and maths, and completed a final project based on my research project at the University of Southampton.
Quest is an innovative liberal arts and sciences university, where courses with no more than 20 students are taken one at a time in sequential, intensive, immersive month-long blocks of inquiry based learning, promoting collaboration with peers and professors in group/individual projects.
Visiting Research Student
University of Southampton
10/2019 — 01/2020
I conducted particle image velocimetry under the guidance of Dr Christina Vanderwel of cambered and symmetric aerofoils at different angles of attack in low Reynolds number flow in a water tunnel to observe vortex shedding and coherent structures from the separated flow. The data were used to complete my final project (Keystone) for Quest University Canada.
Education Technology Intern
Independent Schools Foundation Academy
06/2018 — 08/2018
I managed the school's online learning platform during an unexpected staff vacancy by taking the initiative to learn HTML, Javascript, and MySQL to help the transition from one school year to the next. As a result, I was able to perform my tasks and user requests much quicker, culminating in a project to automate a yearly process, which put the team I worked with weeks ahead of schedule.