The understanding of transport and mixing in fluids in the presence and in the absence
of external fields and reactions represents a challenging topic of strategic relevance
for space exploration. Indeed, mixing and transport of components in a fluid are especially
important during long-term space missions where fuels, food and other materials, needed
for the sustainability of long space travels, must be processed under microgravity
conditions. So far, the processes of transport and mixing have been investigated mainly
at the macroscopic and microscopic scale. Their investigation at the mesoscopic scale
is becoming increasingly important for the understanding of mass transfer in confined
systems, such as porous media, biological systems and microfluidic systems. Microgravity
conditions will provide the opportunity to analyze the effect of external fields and
reactions on optimizing mixing and transport in the absence of the convective flows
induced by buoyancy on Earth. This would be of great practical applicative relevance
to handle complex fluids under microgravity conditions for the processing of materials
in space.
