Velocity field reconstruction using distributed tracers

Methods of velocity field measurements based on the visualization of particles suspended in a fluid (the so-called PIV - Particle Image Velocimetry and PTV - Particle Tracking Velocimetry methods) become more and more popular in experimental fluid dynamics during the last decade. However, both the PIV and PTV methods consider all particles as point objects, whereas some fluid experiments lead to visualization of images with space-distributed structures. We consider algorithms which allow us to reconstruct the velocity field in these cases. The work was supported by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research and by the government of the Perm territory (RFFI-Ural 04-01-96005).