Shower-curtain effect

In physics, the shower-curtain effect is the phenomenon in which a shower curtain gets blown inwards with a running shower, regardless of the temperature of the water.

The problem of the cause of this effect has been featured in Scientific American magazine, with several theories given to explain the phenomenon but no definite conclusion.

It has since been solved by a computer model of a typical bathroom. The spray from the shower-head drives a horizontal vortex. This vortex has a low-pressure zone in the centre, which sucks the curtain.

One solution to the problem is to use shower curtains with magnets strung along the bottom that affix to the side of a metal bathtub.

David Schmidt of University of Massachusetts was awarded the 2001 Ig Nobel Prize in Physics for his partial solution to the question of why shower curtains billow inwards. He used a computational fluid dynamics code to achieve the results.