Pattern formation in nonequilibrium systems

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What causes a road to develop washboard ripples? Why does honey curl when it hits the pancake? What determines the rippled shape of icicles? All these questions are the subject matter of Pattern Formation, the branch of condensed matter Physics that deals with the emergence of ordered stuctures under driven, open, far-from-equilibrium conditions. Condensed matter physics usually treats systems in a state of equilibrium, where they show no change in time. A perfect crystal is an example of order that appears in equilibrium. Ordered structures can also appear when a system is driven into motion by outside forces. In fact, most of the order we see in the universe is of this kind. This category of order encompasses everything from ripples on wind-blown sand to the structure of galaxies to Life Itself. Patterns have underlying symmetries and mathematical similarities that can be investigated by a combination of laboratory experiments, theory and computer simulation. Patterns exhibit universal behaviour across many length and time scales.