The physics of curly hair
The heroes and villains in animated films tend to be on opposite ends of the moral spectrum. But they’re often similar in their hair, which is usually extremely rigid or — if it moves at all — is straight and swings to and fro. It’s rare to see an animated character with bouncy, curly hair, since computer animators don’t have a simple mathematical means for describing it.However, change may be coming soon to a theater near you: In a paper appearing in the Feb. 13 issue of Physical Review Letters, researchers at MIT and the Université Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris provide the first detailed model for the 3-D shape of a strand of curly hair. This work could have applications in the computer animation film industry, but it also could be used by engineers to predict the curve that long steel pipes, tubing, and cable develop after being...