Scientists, philosophers, and artists have been captivated by fluid flow for hundreds of years. Da Vinci spent the last 10 years of his life painting spiraling whirlpools and Bernoulli was fascinated by the curves he saw in natural flow. With the advent of powerful mathematical tools and the Navier Stokes equations, scientists such as Theodore von Karman, G.K. Batchelor, and Hans J. Lugt carried out comprehensive studies of fluid movement and vortical flow.

PAX Scientific CEO Jay Harman is the first person to isolate the geometries that underlie natural flow and adapt those geometries to technology. As a naturalist with the Australian Department of Fisheries and Wildlife (DFW), he developed a fundamental understanding of the flow geometries of ocean and air currents. He repeatedly encountered the effectiveness of natural flow. From his observations, he asked a simple question: “If fluids always tend to follow a particular path, is there a way to design equipment that takes advantage of this fact?”

The Streamlining Principle

The answer to Harman's question is what we call the Streamlining Principle. This approach translates nature's flow efficiencies into streamlined design geometries. PAX can then employ these geometries to significantly improve the performance, output, and energy usage of a wide range of technology. This conscious emulation of natural solutions, dubbed biomimicry by author Janine Benyus, gives PAX a distinct commercial advantage.

Harman first applied the Streamlining Principle to nautical design, producing the award-winning Goggleboat and WildThing series of watercraft. Built using Harman's streamlining geometries, these boats confirmed many of the underlying theories of the Streamlining Principle.  In 1997, PAX Scientific was founded to bring the exceptional efficiencies of natural flow to fluid-handling technology, such as fans, mixers, pumps, turbines, heat exchangers, ducts, propellers, and other applications.  To validate the Streamlining Principle, the company entered a research relationship with Cascade Technologies and Stanford University. This research confirmed theories underlying Harman's discoveries and identified substantial improvements in the performance of PAX technology when compared with traditional technology.