Philip L. Roe, the British Scientist. The Cranfield Years and Beyond

Abstract

Philip L. Roe, the renowned British scientist, passed away on April 26, 2026, at the age of 87, while Professor Emeritus at the University of Michigan. My association with Phil Roe began in 1984, when he joined the Cranfield Institute of Technology, UK, as Professor of Computational Fluid Dynamics, while I was a postdoctoral research fellow at the same institution. For more than four decades, his incisive ideas, physical principles and distinctive approach to research on numerical methods for solving hyperbolic partial differential equations have had a lasting influence on my own approach to research in the field. Here I recount some personal memories and anecdotes emerging from the rewarding experience of interacting with Phil during the Cranfield years and beyond. I also review, quite succinctly in places, some of the main research topics that he pursued throughout much of his academic career. These notes are intended as a modest homage to Roe's impact on the subject, as well as to his influence on the careers of generations of scientists in both academia and industry.