Mach number and wall thermal boundary condition effects on near-wall compressible turbulence

We investigate the effects of thermal boundary conditions and Mach number on turbulence close to walls. In particular, we study the near-wall asymptotic behavior for adiabatic and pseudo-adiabatic walls, and compare to the asymptotic behavior recently found near isothermal cold walls (Baranwal et al. (2022)). This is done by analyzing a new large database of highly-resolved direct numerical simulations of turbulent channels with different wall thermal conditions and centerline Mach numbers. We observe that the asymptotic power-law behavior of Reynolds stresses as well as heat fluxes does change with both centerline Mach number and thermal-condition at the wall. Power-law exponents transition from their analytical expansion for solenoidal fields to those for non-solenoidal field as the Mach number is increased, though this transition is found to be dependent on the thermal boundary conditions. The correlation coefficients between velocity and temperature are also found to be affected by these factors. Consistent with recent proposals on universal behavior of compressible turbulence, we find that dilatation at the wall is the key scaling parameter for this power-law exponents providing a universal functional law which can provide a basis for general models of near-wall behavior.Comment: 24 pages, 15 figures, Under consideration for publication in Journal of Fluid Mechanic

Ideal evolution of MHD turbulence when imposing Taylor-Green symmetries

We investigate the ideal and incompressible magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) equations in three space dimensions for the development of potentially singular structures. The methodology consists in implementing the four-fold symmetries of the Taylor-Green vortex generalized to MHD, leading to substantial computer time and memory savings at a given resolution; we also use a re-gridding method that allows for lower-resolution runs at early times, with no loss of spectral accuracy. One magnetic configuration is examined at an equivalent resolution of $6144^3$ points, and three different configurations on grids of $4096^3$ points. At the highest resolution, two different current and vorticity sheet systems are found to collide, producing two successive accelerations in the development of small scales. At the latest time, a convergence of magnetic field lines to the location of maximum current is probably leading locally to a strong bending and directional variability of such lines. A novel analytical method, based on sharp analysis inequalities, is used to assess the validity of the finite-time singularity scenario. This method allows one to rule out spurious singularities by evaluating the rate at which the logarithmic decrement of the analyticity-strip method goes to zero. The result is that the finite-time singularity scenario cannot be ruled out, and the singularity time could be somewhere between $t=2.33$ and $t=2.70.$ More robust conclusions will require higher resolution runs and grid-point interpolation measurements of maximum current and vorticity.Comment: 18 pages, 13 figures, 2 tables; submitted to Physical Review

Vorticity moments in four numerical simulations of the 3D Navier–Stokes equations

The issue of intermittency in numerical solutions of the 3D Navier–Stokes equations on a periodic box [0,L]3 is addressed through four sets of numerical simulations that calculate a new set of variables defined by Dm(t)=(ϖ−10Ωm)αm for 1≤m≤∞ where αm=2m/(4m−3) and [Ωm(t)]2m=L−3∫V|ω|2mdV with ϖ0=νL−2. All four simulations unexpectedly show that the Dm are ordered for m=1,…,9 such that Dm+1<Dm. Moreover, the Dm squeeze together such that Dm+1/Dm↗1 as m increases. The values of D1 lie far above the values of the rest of the Dm, giving rise to a suggestion that a depletion of nonlinearity is occurring which could be the cause of Navier–Stokes regularity. The first simulation is of very anisotropic decaying turbulence; the second and third are of decaying isotropic turbulence from random initial conditions and forced isotropic turbulence at fixed Grashof number respectively; the fourth is of very-high-Reynolds-number forced, stationary, isotropic turbulence at up to resolutions of 40963

Energy Flux and Bottleneck Effect in Turbulence

Past numerical simulations and experiments of turbulence exhibit a hump in the inertial range, called the bottleneck effect. In this paper we show that sufficiently large inertial range (four decades) is required for an effective energy cascade. We propose that the bottleneck effect is due to the insufficient inertial range available in the reported simulations and experiments. To facilitate the turbulent energy transfer, the spectrum near Kolmogorov's dissipation wavenumber has a hump.Comment: 11 pages, 4 Figures, Revte

Physical Processes in Star Formation

© 2020 Springer-Verlag. The final publication is available at Springer via https://doi.org/10.1007/s11214-020-00693-8.Star formation is a complex multi-scale phenomenon that is of significant importance for astrophysics in general. Stars and star formation are key pillars in observational astronomy from local star forming regions in the Milky Way up to high-redshift galaxies. From a theoretical perspective, star formation and feedback processes (radiation, winds, and supernovae) play a pivotal role in advancing our understanding of the physical processes at work, both individually and of their interactions. In this review we will give an overview of the main processes that are important for the understanding of star formation. We start with an observationally motivated view on star formation from a global perspective and outline the general paradigm of the life-cycle of molecular clouds, in which star formation is the key process to close the cycle. After that we focus on the thermal and chemical aspects in star forming regions, discuss turbulence and magnetic fields as well as gravitational forces. Finally, we review the most important stellar feedback mechanisms.Peer reviewedFinal Accepted Versio

Acceleration and dissipation statistics of numerically simulated isotropic turbulence

Direct numerical simulation ͑DNS͒ data at grid resolution up to 2048 3 in isotropic turbulence are used to investigate the statistics of acceleration in a Eulerian frame. A major emphasis is on the use of conditional averaging to relate the intermittency of acceleration to fluctuations of dissipation, enstrophy, and pseudodissipation representing local relative motion in the flow. Pseudodissipation ͑the second invariant of the velocity gradient tensor͒ has the same intermittency exponent as dissipation and is closest to log-normal. Conditional acceleration variances increase with each conditioning variable, consistent with the scenario of rapid changes in velocity for fluid particles moving in local regions of large velocity gradient, but in a manner departing from Kolmogorov&apos;s refined similarity theory. Acceleration conditioned on the pseudodissipation is closest to Gaussian, and well represented by a novel &quot;cubic Gaussian&quot; distribution. Overall the simulation data suggest that, with the aid of appropriate parameterizations, Lagrangian stochastic modeling with pseudodissipation as the conditioning variable is likely to produce superior results. Reduced intermittency of conditional acceleration also makes the present results less sensitive to resolution concerns in DNS

2004 Simulations of three-dimensional turbulent mixing for Schmidt numbers of the order 1000. Flow Turb

Abstract. We report basic results from new numerical simulations of passive scalar mixing at Schmidt numbers (Sc) of the order of 1000 in isotropic turbulence. The required high grid-resolution is made possible by simulating turbulence at very low Reynolds numbers, which nevertheless possesses universality in dissipative scales of motion. The results obtained are qualitatively consistent with those based on another study (Yeung et al., Phys. Fluids 14 (2002) 4178–4191) with a less extended Schmidt number range and a higher Reynolds number. In the stationary state maintained by a uniform mean scalar gradient, the scalar variance increases slightly with Sc but scalar dissipation is nearly constant. As the Schmidt number increases, there is an increasing trend towards k−1 scaling predicted by Batchelor (Batchelor, J. Fluid Mech. 5 (1959) 113–133) for the viscous-convective range of the scalar spectrum; the scalar gradient skewness approaches zero; and the intermittency measured by the scalar gradient flatness approaches its asymptotic state. However, the value of Sc needed for the asymptotic behavior to emerge appears to increase with decreasing Reynolds number of the turbulence. In the viscous-diffusive range, the scalar spectrum is in better agreement with Kraichnan’s (Kraichnan., Phys. Fluids 11 (1968) 945–953) result than with Batchelor’s

Small-scale universality in fluid turbulence

Turbulent flows in nature and technology possess a range of scales. The largest scales carry the memory of the physical system in which a flow is embedded. One challenge is to unravel the universal statistical properties that all turbulent flows share despite their different large-scale driving mechanisms or their particular flow geometries. In the present work, we study three turbulent flows of systematically increasing complexity. These are homogeneous and isotropic turbulence in a periodic box, turbulent shear flow between two parallel walls, and thermal convection in a closed cylindrical container. They are computed by highly resolved direct numerical simulations of the governing dynamical equations. We use these simulation data to establish two fundamental results: (i) at Reynolds numbers Re ∼ 10(2) the fluctuations of the velocity derivatives pass through a transition from nearly Gaussian (or slightly sub-Gaussian) to intermittent behavior that is characteristic of fully developed high Reynolds number turbulence, and (ii) beyond the transition point, the statistics of the rate of energy dissipation in all three flows obey the same Reynolds number power laws derived for homogeneous turbulence. These results allow us to claim universality of small scales even at low Reynolds numbers. Our results shed new light on the notion of when the turbulence is fully developed at the small scales without relying on the existence of an extended inertial range