Academician Vladan Đorđević passed away

It is with deep regret that the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts announces the passing of its full member of the Department of Technical Sciences Vladan Đorđević, aged 84 (b. 12 December in Kruševac), one of our most distinguished experts in the field of mechanical engineering, in Belgrade, on 15 October 2022.

The basic scientific and expert field of work of Academician Đorđević was theoretical and applied mechanics of fluids, particularly boundary layer theory, theory of inhomogeneous and rotating fluid flows, theory of wave motion of fluids and theory of hydrodynamic stability and transition into turbulence. The field of his scientific work included fluid biomechanics, as well as the issues of gas flows in micro-channels, which have numerous applications in contemporary microelectromechanical systems technologies.

He graduated from the Department of Hydro Energy at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering of the University of Belgrade in 1961. He finished his post-doc studies at the Group of Mechanics of the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics in Belgrade, where he received his MSc in 1963, and PhD in 1966, in the field of boundary layer theory.

As a Humboldt research fellow, he completed his post-doctoral specialization at Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg (1968-1969). As a Fulbright fellow, he worked as a visiting researcher at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles (1975-1976), where he later worked as a visiting professor, in the departments of aerospace and mechanical engineering.

Following his graduation, he began working as a teaching assistant at the Department of Fluid Mechanics at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering of the University of Belgrade in 1962. He held all teaching positions at the same Faculty, and he was elected a full professor in 1981. He taught courses Mechanics of Fluid and Hydraulics and Pneumatics. He was a vice-rector for education in the period from 1989-1991, and the head of the Department of Mechanics of Fluid (1988-2000).

He was elected a corresponding member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts in 1985, and a full member in 1997. He presided over the Board for the Study of the Life and Work of Scientists in Serbia and Scientists of Serbian Descent from 2002, and he was also the editor-in-chief of the SASA edition ‘Život i delo srpskih naučnika'[Life and Work of Serbian Scientists]. During the period from 2000-2006, he was the head of the Department of Mechanics at the Mathematical Institute of SASA.

He carried out the duties of the general secretary and president of the Yugoslav Society of Mechanics, as well as of the president of the Serbian Society of Mechanics (1983‒1985). He was a member of the European Association of Mechanics, Society for Applied Mathematics and Mechanics, Academy of Engineering Sciences of Serbia and other scientific institutions.

During his fruitful scientific career, he published more than 100 scientific papers in the basic field and current subfields of fluid mechanics. Most of his works have been published in highly notable international scientific journals such as Journal of Fluid Mechanics, Physics of Fluids, Wave Motion, Transactions of the Royal Society A, Journal of Applied Mathematics and Physics, Journal of Applied Mathematics and Mechanics. He is the author of two textbooks in the field of theoretical and applied mechanics of fluid. Throughout his research career, he cooperated with the Military Technical Institute in Belgrade, where he worked on the development of semi-automatic and automatic chemical detectors. In the extensive opus of Academician Đorđević’s scientific work, the research of the rheological behaviour of human cells holds a special place which he conducted in cooperation with Boston University.

For his scientific work, he received numerous awards, some of which are: the Professor Vojislav K. Stojanović Award of the Association of University Teachers and Scientists of Serbia (2007), Vidovdan Charter of the Town of Kruševac (2015) and Academician Ljubomir Klerić Recognition of Life Achievement of the Department of Mining, Geological and Systematic Sciences of the Academy of Engineering Sciences of Serbia (2016).

He greatly contributed to science development in Serbia with his research and educational work.

His passing represents a great loss for the Department of Technical Sciences of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts and the overall Serbian science.