Decay of a coherent scalar disturbance in a turbulent flow

The time evolution of an initially coherent, sinusoidal passive-scalar disturbance is considered when the wavelength q is less than the length scale of the surrounding isotropic turbulent flow. In 64 sup 3 direct numerical simulations a Gaussian prescription for the average scalar amplitude breaks down after a timescale associated with the wavenumber of the disturbance and there is a transition to a new characteristic decay. The Gaussian prescription is given by exp(-(1/2) q-squared w(t)), where a form for w(t), the Lagrangian mean square displacement of a single fluid particle, is proposed. After the transition the decay is given by exp(-t/tau), where tau is the new characteristic timescale. If q k(sub K), then 1/tau = 1/tau(sub D) + 1/tau(sub K), where k(sub K) is the Kolmogorov wavenumber, tau(sub D) is the diffusive timescale and tau(sub K) is the Kolmogorov timescale. An experiment originally proposed by de Gennesis considered in which the evolution of a coherent laser-induced pattern is read by a diffracting laser. The theory of this experiment involves the dispersion of particle pairs, but it is shown that in a certain limit it reduces to the single Fourier-mode problem and can be described in terms of single particle diffusion. The decay of a single mode after the transition in the simulation best describes the experiment

Creating Natural Distinctions

At the 1991 CLAGS conference on The Homosexual Brain, Dorothy Nelkin argued that linking homosexual behavior to brain structure reflects in part the growing preoccupation with biological determinism in American culture. Responding to the expectation that defining homosexuality as a biological status will reduce prejudice, she suggested that genetic explanations in fact can serve multiple social agendas. In particular, they have in the past been used to justify social stereotypes and persistent inequities as natural and therefore inevitable. Thus, while biological claims could lead to greater tolerance for human differences, they can also lead to pernicious abuse. Ultimately, it is not biology but common beliefs and social biases that shape social policies. The appropriation of genetic explanations is the subject of a book by Dorothy Nelkin and M. Susan Lindee, The DNA Mystique: The Gene as a Cultural Icon. The following material, excerpted from this book, contains the core of Nelkin\u27s 1991 remarks

Cloning in the Popular Imagination

Dolly is a cloned sheet born in July 1996 at the Roslin Institute in Edinburgh by Ian Wilmut, a British embryologist. She was produced, after 276 failed attempts, from the genetic material of a six-year-old sheep. But Dolly is also a Rorschach test. The public response to the production of a lamb from an adult cell mirrors the futuristic fantasies and Frankenstein fears that have more broadly surrounded research in genetics, and especially genetic engineering. Dolly stands in for other monstrosities—both actual and fictional—that human knowledge and technique have produced. She provokes fear not so much because she is novel, but because she is such a familiar entity: a biological product of human design who appears to be a human surrogate. Dolly as virtual person is terrifying and seductive—despite her placid temperament

An inertial range length scale in structure functions

It is shown using experimental and numerical data that within the traditional inertial subrange defined by where the third order structure function is linear that the higher order structure function scaling exponents for longitudinal and transverse structure functions converge only over larger scales, $r>r_S$, where $r_S$ has scaling intermediate between $\eta$ and $\lambda$ as a function of $R_\lambda$. Below these scales, scaling exponents cannot be determined for any of the structure functions without resorting to procedures such as extended self-similarity (ESS). With ESS, different longitudinal and transverse higher order exponents are obtained that are consistent with earlier results. The relationship of these statistics to derivative and pressure statistics, to turbulent structures and to length scales is discussed.Comment: 25 pages, 9 figure

Logarithmic scaling in the near-dissipation range of turbulence

A logarithmic scaling for structure functions, in the form $S_p \sim [\ln (r/\eta)]^{\zeta_p}$, where $\eta$ is the Kolmogorov dissipation scale and $\zeta_p$ are the scaling exponents, is suggested for the statistical description of the near-dissipation range for which classical power-law scaling does not apply. From experimental data at moderate Reynolds numbers, it is shown that the logarithmic scaling, deduced from general considerations for the near-dissipation range, covers almost the entire range of scales (about two decades) of structure functions, for both velocity and passive scalar fields. This new scaling requires two empirical constants, just as the classical scaling does, and can be considered the basis for extended self-similarity

Kolmogorov turbulence in a random-force-driven Burgers equation

The dynamics of velocity fluctuations, governed by the one-dimensional Burgers equation, driven by a white-in-time random force with the spatial spectrum \overline{|f(k)|^2}\proptok^{-1}, is considered. High-resolution numerical experiments conducted in this work give the energy spectrum $E(k)\propto k^{-\beta}$ with $\beta =5/3\pm 0.02$. The observed two-point correlation function $C(k,\omega)$ reveals $\omega\propto k^z$ with the "dynamical exponent" $z\approx 2/3$. High-order moments of velocity differences show strong intermittency and are dominated by powerful large-scale shocks. The results are compared with predictions of the one-loop renormalized perturbation expansion.Comment: 13 LaTeX pages, psfig.sty macros, Phys. Rev. E 51, R2739 (1995)

Fusion Rules in Turbulent Systems with Flux Equilibrium

Fusion rules in turbulence specify the analytic structure of many-point correlation functions of the turbulent field when a group of coordinates coalesce. We show that the existence of flux equilibrium in fully developed turbulent systems combined with a direct cascade induces universal fusion rules. In certain examples these fusion rules suffice to compute the multiscaling exponents exactly, and in other examples they give rise to an infinite number of scaling relations that constrain enormously the structure of the allowed theory.Comment: Submitted to PRL on July 95, 4 pages, REVTe

UK science press officers, professional vision and the generation of expectations

Science press officers can play an integral role in helping promote expectations and hype about biomedical research. Using this as a starting point, this article draws on interviews with 10 UK-based science press officers, which explored how they view their role as science reporters and as generators of expectations. Using Goodwin’s notion of ‘professional vision’, we argue that science press officers have a specific professional vision that shapes how they produce biomedical press releases, engage in promotion of biomedical research and make sense of hype. We discuss how these insights can contribute to the sociology of expectations, as well as inform responsible science communication.This project was funded by the Wellcome Trust (Wellcome Trust Biomedical Strategic Award 086034)

Size limiting in Tsallis statistics

Power law scaling is observed in many physical, biological and socio-economical complex systems and is now considered as an important property of these systems. In general, power law exists in the central part of the distribution. It has deviations from power law for very small and very large step sizes. Tsallis, through non-extensive thermodynamics, explained power law distribution in many cases including deviation from the power law, both for small and very large steps. In case of very large steps, they used heuristic crossover approach. In real systems, the size is limited and thus, the size limiting factor is important. In the present work, we present an alternative model in which we consider that the entropy factor q decreases with step size due to the softening of long range interactions or memory. This explains the deviation of power law for very large step sizes. Finally, we apply this model for distribution of citation index of scientists and examination scores and are able to explain the entire distribution including deviations from power law.Comment: 22 pages, 8 figure

Exact Resummations in the Theory of Hydrodynamic Turbulence: I The Ball of Locality and Normal Scaling

This paper is the first in a series of three papers that aim at understanding the scaling behaviour of hydrodynamic turbulence. We present in this paper a perturbative theory for the structure functions and the response functions of the hydrodynamic velocity field in real space and time. Starting from the Navier-Stokes equations (at high Reynolds number Re) we show that the standard perturbative expansions that suffer from infra-red divergences can be exactly resummed using the Belinicher-L'vov transformation. After this exact (partial) resummation it is proven that the resulting perturbation theory is free of divergences, both in large and in small spatial separations. The hydrodynamic response and the correlations have contributions that arise from mediated interactions which take place at some space- time coordinates. It is shown that the main contribution arises when these coordinates lie within a shell of a "ball of locality" that is defined and discussed. We argue that the real space-time formalism developed here offers a clear and intuitive understanding of every diagram in the theory, and of every element in the diagrams. One major consequence of this theory is that none of the familiar perturbative mechanisms may ruin the classical Kolmogorov (K41) scaling solution for the structure functions. Accordingly, corrections to the K41 solutions should be sought in nonperturbative effects. These effects are the subjects of papers II and III in this series, that will propose a mechanism for anomalous scaling in turbulence, which in particular allows multiscaling of the structure functions.Comment: PRE in press, 18 pages + 6 figures, REVTeX. The Eps files of figures will be FTPed by request to [email protected]