Motion of finite-size spheres released in a turbulent boundary layer

Individual magnetic wax spheres with specific gravities of 1.006, 1.054 and 1.152 were released from rest on a smooth wall in water at friction Reynolds numbers, Re_{\tau}=680 and 1320 (d^+ = 58 and 122 viscous units, respectively). Three-dimensional tracking was conducted to understand the effect of turbulence and wall friction on sphere motions. Spheres subjected to sufficient mean shear initially lifted off of the wall before descending back towards it. These lifting spheres translated with the fluid above the wall, undergoing saltation or resuspension, with minimal rotation about any axis. By contrast, spheres that did not lift off upon release mainly slid along the wall. These denser spheres lagged the fluid more significantly due to greater wall friction. As they slid downstream, they began to roll forward after which small repeated lift-off events occurred. These spheres also rotated about both the streamwise and wall-normal axes. In all cases, the sphere trajectories were limited to the buffer and logarithmic regions, and all wall collisions were completely inelastic. Sphere streamwise velocities fluctuated up to 20% from the mean value even after the sphere had attained an approximate terminal velocity. In the plane parallel to the wall, the spheres migrated in the spanwise direction about 12% of the streamwise distance traveled suggesting that spanwise forces are important. The variations in sphere kinematics were likely induced by high and low momentum zones in the boundary layer, vortex shedding in the sphere wakes, and wall friction. The repeated lift-offs of the forward rolling denser sphere were attributed to a Magnus lift.Comment: Revised manuscript accepted by International Journal of Multiphase Flow on September 13, 2020; 33pages; 10 figure

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead

Pinch off and reconnection in liquid/liquid flows: joint experimental and numerical studies

Liquid/liquid systems appear in applications involving transport, mixing, and separation of petroleum, chemical, and waste products. Breakup and coalescence transitions often determine flow regimes as well as reaction and separation rates. Because they occur over very small time and length scales compared with the larger scales that dominate the flow, they are difficult to quantify experimentally and simulate numerically. Thus far, no accurate models exist for engineers to predict these flows. Experiments and computations were performed so that accurate engineering models can be developed. Jet pinch off and drop coalescence were examined in mixtures of water/glycerin and silicone oil. Index matching, laser sheet illumination, and the PIV method were applied to obtain visualization and velocity field sequences through transitions. The computations used a novel, physically-based method that captures interface breakup and coalescence automatically without resorting to ad-hoc cut-and-connect methods. To achieve enhanced accuracy near transitions, new adaptive time and space meshes were developed. The computations were validated through direct comparison with the experiments. The detailed results should lead to improved understanding of transition behavior. This understanding is needed to develop engineering models of multiphase flows. Such predictive models will lead to extensive cost savings in device and process design

Characteristics of vortex packets in turbulent boundary layers

Stereoscopic particle image velocimetry (PIV) was used to measure all three instantaneous components of the velocity field in streamwise–spanwise planes of a turbulent boundary layer at Reτ = 1060 (Reθ = 2500). Datasets were obtained in the logarithmic layer and beyond. The vector fields in the log layer (z+=92 and 150) revealed signatures of vortex packets similar to those proposed by Adrian and co-workers in their PIV experiments. Groups of legs of hairpin vortices appeared to be coherently arranged in the streamwise direction. These regions also generated substantial Reynolds shear stress, sometimes as high as 40 times —uw‾.  A feature extraction algorithm was developed to automate the identification and characterization of these packets of hairpin vortices. Identified patches contributed 28% to —uw¯ while occupying only 4% of the total area at z+ = 92. At z+ = 150, these patches occupied 4.5% of the total area while contributing 25% to —uw¯. Beyond the log layer (z+ = 198 and 530), the spatial organization into packets is seen to break down.<br/