article published yes Björn Hof author 3A374330-F248-11E8-B48F-1D18A9856A870000-0003-2057-2754 BjHo department It may come as a surprise that a phenomenon as ubiquitous and prominent as the transition from laminar to turbulent flow has resisted combined efforts by physicists, engineers and mathematicians, and remained unresolved for almost one and a half centuries. In recent years, various studies have proposed analogies to directed percolation, a well-known universality class in statistical mechanics, which describes a non-equilibrium phase transition from a fluctuating active phase into an absorbing state. It is this unlikely relation between the multiscale, high-dimensional dynamics that signify the transition process in virtually all flows of practical relevance, and the arguably most basic non-equilibrium phase transition, that so far has mainly been the subject of model studies, which I review in this Perspective. Springer Nature2023 eng General Physics and Astronomy 2522-5820 00089014870000210.1038/s42254-022-00539-y 562-72 B. Hof, “Directed percolation and the transition to turbulence,” <i>Nature Reviews Physics</i>, vol. 5. Springer Nature, pp. 62–72, 2023. Hof, B. (2023). Directed percolation and the transition to turbulence. <i>Nature Reviews Physics</i>. Springer Nature. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s42254-022-00539-y">https://doi.org/10.1038/s42254-022-00539-y</a> Hof, Björn. “Directed Percolation and the Transition to Turbulence.” <i>Nature Reviews Physics</i>. Springer Nature, 2023. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s42254-022-00539-y">https://doi.org/10.1038/s42254-022-00539-y</a>. Hof B. Directed percolation and the transition to turbulence. <i>Nature Reviews Physics</i>. 2023;5:62-72. doi:<a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s42254-022-00539-y">10.1038/s42254-022-00539-y</a> Hof, Björn. “Directed Percolation and the Transition to Turbulence.” <i>Nature Reviews Physics</i>, vol. 5, Springer Nature, 2023, pp. 62–72, doi:<a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s42254-022-00539-y">10.1038/s42254-022-00539-y</a>. B. Hof, Nature Reviews Physics 5 (2023) 62–72. Hof B. 2023. Directed percolation and the transition to turbulence. Nature Reviews Physics. 5, 62–72. 121652023-01-12T12:10:18Z2024-10-09T21:04:02Z