The movement of players compared with the behavior of particles in a fluid
Researchers from the Central school of Lyon described the motion of particles in two-dimensional layers of fluid in a limited volume. They also showed that it is similar to the movement of players during football matches.
A study published in the journal Physical Review Fluids, and briefly about it reports New Scientist.
Many complex physical processes have their counterparts in everyday phenomena. One such phenomenon is the behavior of groups of people. The movement of a single member of the crowd or group has a specific purpose and direction, which, however, do not necessarily reflect the General behavior. French scientists decided to compare the behavior of randomly moving particles with players on the football field and find between these processes General laws.
The researchers observed the behavior of particles in a fluid with turbulent flows. If you look over their movement within a short period of time, it seems that they are moving in a straight line. On longer time scales, the particles begin to chaotically move in a different direction.
Assuming that the fluid is far away from any boundaries, the average angle deviation is 90 degrees. But if you enclose the liquid in a rectangular volume, the average deflection angle will be 120 degrees.
Scientists decided to find similar patterns in the processes with completely different physical principles and has chosen to do this, the movement of the players on the football field. For this they used sensors attached to the feet of the players, and a special tracking system in the stadium in Nuremberg in the same city of Germany. Data were collected on the training match, which involved two teams of 8 people.
It turned out that, despite each individual moment of the match tactics and intelligent movement in a large time scale, the players on average change their direction by 120 degrees, and the particles in the fluid.
On this basis, physicists have made the assumption that the rotation angle caused by geometrical properties of the medium.
In 2012 British scientists have developed a technique that allows using graph theory to quantitatively describe the style of play different soccer teams.
Gregory Copies