On a model of forced axisymmetric flows

In this work, we consider a model of forced axisymmetric flows which is derived from the inviscid Boussinesq equations. What makes these equations unusual is the boundary conditions they are expected to satisfy and the fact that the boundary is part of the unknown. We show that these flows give rise to an unusual Monge-Ampere equations for which we prove the existence and the uniqueness of a variational solution. We take advantage of these Monge-Ampere equations and construct a solution to the model

Mean flow stability analysis of oscillating jet experiments

Linear stability analysis is applied to the mean flow of an oscillating round jet with the aim to investigate the robustness and accuracy of mean flow stability wave models. The jet's axisymmetric mode is excited at the nozzle lip through a sinusoidal modulation of the flow rate at amplitudes ranging from 0.1 % to 100 %. The instantaneous flow field is measured via particle image velocimetry and decomposed into a mean and periodic part utilizing proper orthogonal decomposition. Local linear stability analysis is applied to the measured mean flow adopting a weakly nonparallel flow approach. The resulting global perturbation field is carefully compared to the measurements in terms of spatial growth rate, phase velocity, and phase and amplitude distribution. It is shown that the stability wave model accurately predicts the excited flow oscillations during their entire growth phase and during a large part of their decay phase. The stability wave model applies over a wide range of forcing amplitudes, showing no pronounced sensitivity to the strength of nonlinear saturation. The upstream displacement of the neutral point and the successive reduction of gain with increasing forcing amplitude is very well captured by the stability wave model. At very strong forcing (>40%), the flow becomes essentially stable to the axisymmetric mode. For these extreme cases, the prediction deteriorates from the measurements due to an interaction of the forced wave with the geometric confinement of the nozzle. Moreover, the model fails far downstream in a region where energy is transferred from the oscillation back to the mean flow. This study supports previously conducted mean flow stability analysis of self-excited flow oscillations in the cylinder wake and in the vortex breakdown bubble and extends the methodology to externally forced convectively unstable flows.Comment: submitted to the Journal of Fluid Mechanic

Nonlinear dynamo in a short Taylor-Couette setup

It is numerically demonstrated by means of a magnetohydrodynamics code that a short Taylor-Couette setup with a body force can sustain dynamo action. The magnetic threshold is comparable to what is usually obtained in spherical geometries. The linear dynamo is characterized by a rotating equatorial dipole. The nonlinear regime is characterized by fluctuating kinetic and magnetic energies and a tilted dipole whose axial component exhibits aperiodic reversals during the time evolution. These numerical evidences of dynamo action in a short Taylor-Couette setup may be useful for developing an experimental device

Precession-driven flows in non-axisymmetric ellipsoids

We study the flow forced by precession in rigid non-axisymmetric ellipsoidal containers. To do so, we revisit the inviscid and viscous analytical models that have been previously developed for the spheroidal geometry by, respectively, Poincar\'e (Bull. Astronomique, vol. XXVIII, 1910, pp. 1-36) and Busse (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 33, 1968, pp. 739-751), and we report the first numerical simulations of flows in such a geometry. In strong contrast with axisymmetric spheroids, where the forced flow is systematically stationary in the precessing frame, we show that the forced flow is unsteady and periodic. Comparisons of the numerical simulations with the proposed theoretical model show excellent agreement for both axisymmetric and non-axisymmetric containers. Finally, since the studied configuration corresponds to a tidally locked celestial body such as the Earth's Moon, we use our model to investigate the challenging but planetary-relevant limit of very small Ekman numbers and the particular case of our Moon

Weakly nonlinear modelling of a forced turbulent axisymmetric wake

A theory is presented where the weakly nonlinear analysis of laminar globally unstable flows in the presence of external forcing is extended to the turbulent regime. The analysis is demonstrated and validated using experimental results of an axisymmetric bluff-body wake at high Reynolds numbers, Re_D ∼1.88×10^5, where forcing is applied using a zero-net-mass-flux actuator located at the base of the blunt body. In this study we focus on the response of antisymmetric coherent structures with azimuthal wavenumbers m = ±1at a frequency St_D = 0.2 S, responsible for global vortex shedding. We found experimentally that axisymmetric forcing (m = 0) couples nonlinearly with the global shedding mode when the flow is forced at twice the shedding frequency, resulting in parametric subharmonic resonance through a triadic interaction between forcing and shedding. We derive simple weakly nonlinear models from the phase-averaged Navier–Stokes equations and show that they capture accurately the observed behaviour for this type of forcing. The unknown model coefficients are obtained experimentally by producing harmonic transients. This approach should be applicable in a variety of turbulent flows to describe the response of global modes to forcing

Two-dimensionalization of the flow driven by a slowly rotating impeller in a rapidly rotating fluid

We characterize the two-dimensionalization process in the turbulent flow produced by an impeller rotating at a rate $\omega$ in a fluid rotating at a rate $\Omega$ around the same axis for Rossby number $Ro=\omega/\Omega$ down to $10^{-2}$. The flow can be described as the superposition of a large-scale vertically invariant global rotation and small-scale shear layers detached from the impeller blades. As $Ro$ decreases, the large-scale flow is subjected to azimuthal modulations. In this regime, the shear layers can be described in terms of wakes of inertial waves traveling with the blades, originating from the velocity difference between the non-axisymmetric large-scale flow and the blade rotation. The wakes are well defined and stable at low Rossby number, but they become disordered at $Ro$ of order of 1. This experiment provides insight into the route towards pure two-dimensionalization induced by a background rotation for flows driven by a non-axisymmetric rotating forcing.Comment: Accepted for publication in Physical Review Fluid

Dynamics and thermodynamics of axisymmetric flows: I. Theory

We develop new variational principles to study stability and equilibrium of axisymmetric flows. We show that there is an infinite number of steady state solutions. We show that these steady states maximize a (non-universal) $H$-function. We derive relaxation equations which can be used as numerical algorithm to construct stable stationary solutions of axisymmetric flows. In a second part, we develop a thermodynamical approach to the equilibrium states at some fixed coarse-grained scale. We show that the resulting distribution can be divided in a universal part coming from the conservation of robust invariants and one non-universal determined by the initial conditions through the fragile invariants (for freely evolving systems) or by a prior distribution encoding non-ideal effects such as viscosity, small-scale forcing and dissipation (for forced systems). Finally, we derive a parameterization of inviscid mixing to describe the dynamics of the system at the coarse-grained scale