Nikolay Yegorovich Zhukovsky (Russian: Никола́й Его́рович Жуко́вский; January 17 [O.S. January 5] 1847, Orekhovo, Vladimir Governorate – March 17, 1921, Moscow) was a Russian scientist, founding father of modern aero- and hydrodynamics. Whereas contemporary scientists scoffed at the idea of human flight, Zhukovsky was the first to undertake the study of airflow.
His name is usually romanised as Joukovsky or Joukowsky in the literature. See for example Joukowsky transform (also Kutta-Schukowski transform), Kutta–Joukowski theorem and so on.
Zhukovsky was born in the village of Orekhovo, Vladimir Governorate, Russian Empire. He graduated from Moscow University in 1868. From 1872 he was a professor at the Imperial Technical School. He established the world's first Aerodynamic Institute in 1904 in Kachino near Moscow. From 1918 he was the head of TsAGI (Central AeroHydroDynamics Institute).
He was the first scientist to explain mathematically the origin of aerodynamic lift, through his circulation hypothesis, the first to dimension the lift force generated by a body moving through an ideal fluid as proportional to the velocity and the circulation around the body, and through a mathematical conformal transformation the first to define the shape of the aerodynamic profile having as essential elements a rounded nose (leading edge), double surface (finite thickness), cambered or straight, and a sharp tail (trailing edge). He built the first wind tunnel in Russia. The transform that bears his name was, however, first derived by the German mathematician Otto Blumenthal, and thus represents an example of Stigler's Law
He is also responsible for the eponymous water hammer equation used by civil engineers. This is usually known as the Joukowsky equation.
A city near Moscow and the crater Zhukovskiy on the Moon are named in his honor.