Kelly Greco (Sea World, Orlando)
Dolphin Plays With Toroidal Vortex
A toroidal vortex, also called a vortex ring, is a region of rotating fluid moving through the same or different fluid where the flow pattern takes on a toroidal (doughnut) shape.
The movement of the fluid is about the poloidal or circular axis of the doughnut, in a twisting vortex motion. Examples of this phenomenon are a smoke ring or a microburst.
Vortex rings were first mathematically analyzed by the German physicist Hermann von Helmholtz, in his paper of 1867 On Integrals of the Hydrodynamical Equations which Express Vortex-motion Smoke rings have probably been observed since antiquity since they can easily be blown from the mouth.
