Cornstarch might have ended the Gulf spill agony sooner

Last year’s attempt to kill the Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico by pouring heavy mud down the well bore may have been defeated by an instability that led to turbulent mixing of the oil and the mud. Jonathan Katz, PhD, professor of physics at Washington University in St. Louis, had suggested a simple solution to the problem: cornstarch. Experiments described in an article published recently in Physical Review Letters suggest his solution might have worked.