255 research outputs found
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Scaling and dynamics of turbulence over sparseA canopies
Turbulent flows within and over sparse canopies are investigated using direct
numerical simulations. We focus on the effect of the canopy on the background
turbulence, the part of the flow that remains once the element-induced flow is
filtered out. In channel flows, the distribution of the total stress is linear
with height. Over smooth walls, the total stress is only the `fluid stress'
, the sum of the viscous and the Reynolds shear stresses. In canopies,
in turn, there is an additional contribution from the canopy drag, which can
dominate within. We find that, for sparse canopies, the ratio of the viscous
and the Reynolds shear stresses in at each height is similar to that
over smooth-walls, even within the canopy. From this, a height-dependent
scaling based on is proposed. Using this scaling, the background
turbulence within the canopy shows similarities with turbulence over smooth
walls. This suggests that the background turbulence scales with ,
rather than with the conventional scaling based on the total stress. This
effect is essentially captured when the canopy is substituted by a drag force
that acts on the mean velocity profile alone, aiming to produce the correct
, without the discrete presence of the canopy elements acting directly
on the fluctuations. The proposed mean-only forcing is shown to produce better
estimates for the turbulent fluctuations compared to a conventional,
homogeneous-drag model. The present results thus suggest that a sparse canopy
acts on the background turbulence primarily through the change it induces on
the mean velocity profile, which in turn sets the scale for turbulence, rather
than through a direct interaction of the canopy elements with the fluctuations.
The effect of the element-induced flow, however, requires the representation of
the individual canopy elements.Cambridge Commonwealth, European and International Trust
PRACE DECI-15
European Research Counci
Turbulent flows over dense filament canopies
Turbulent flows over dense canopies of rigid filaments of small size are
investigated for different element heights and spacings using DNS. The flow can
be decomposed into the element-coherent, dispersive flow, the
Kelvin--Helmholtz-like rollers typically reported over dense canopies, and the
background, incoherent turbulence. The canopies studied have spacings --, which essentially preclude the background turbulence from penetrating
within. The dispersive velocity fluctuations are also mainly determined by the
spacing, and are small deep within the canopy, where the footprint of the
Kelvin--Helmholtz-like rollers dominates. Their typical streamwise wavelength
is determined by the mixing length, which is essentially the sum of its height
above and below the canopy tips. For the present dense canopies, the former
remains roughly the same in wall-units, and the latter, which scales with the
drag length, depends linearly on the spacing. This is the result of the drag
being essentially viscous and governed by the planar layout of the canopy. In
shallow canopies, the proximity of the canopy floor inhibits the formation of
Kelvin--Helmholtz-like rollers, with essentially no signature for
height-to-spacing ratios , and no further inhibition beyond . Very small spacings also inhibit the rollers, due to their
obstruction by the canopy elements. The obstruction decreases with increasing
spacing and the signature of the instability intensifies, even if for canopies
sparser than those studied here the instability eventually breaks down. Simple
models based on linear stability can capture some of the above effects.Cambridge Commonwealth, European and International Trust
EPSRC Tier-2 grant EP/P020259/
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Analysis of anisotropically permeable surfaces for turbulent drag reduction
The present work proposes the use of anisotropically permeable substrates as a means to reduce
turbulent skin friction. We conduct an a priori analysis to assess the potential of these surfaces,
based on the effect of small-scale surface manipulations on near-wall turbulence. The analysis, valid
for small permeability, predicts a monotonic decrease in friction as the streamwise permeability
increases. Empirical results suggest that the drag-reducing mechanism is however bound to fail
beyond a certain permeability. We investigate the development of Kelvin-Helmholtz-like rollers at
the surface as a potential mechanism for this failure. These rollers, which are a typical feature of
turbulent flows over permeable walls, are known to increase drag, and their appearance to limit the
drag-reducing effect. We propose a model, based on linear stability analysis, which predicts the
onset of these rollers for sufficiently large permeability, and allows us to bound the maximum drag
reduction that these surfaces can achieve
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Imposing virtual origins on the velocity components in direct numerical simulations
The relative wall-normal displacement of the origin perceived by different components of near-wall turbulence is known to produce a change in drag. This effect is produced for instance by drag-reducing surfaces of small texture size like riblets and superhydrophobic surfaces. To facilitate the research on how these displacements alter near-wall turbulence, this paper studies different strategies to model such displacement effect through manipulated boundary conditions. Previous research has considered the effect of offsetting the virtual origins perceived by the tangential components of the velocity from the reference, boundary plane, where the wall-normal velocity was set to zero. These virtual origins are typically characterised by slip-length coefficients in Robin, slip-like boundary conditions. In this paper, we extend this idea and explore several techniques to define and implement virtual origins for all three velocity components on direct numerical simulations (DNSs) of channel flows, with special emphasis on the wall-normal velocity. The aim of this work is to provide a suitable foundation to extend the existing understanding on how these virtual origins affect the near-wall turbulence, and ultimately aid in the formulation of simplified models that capture the effect of complex surfaces on the overlying flow and on drag, without the need to resolve fully the turbulence and the surface texture. From the techniques tested, Robin boundary conditions for all three velocities are found to be the most satisfactory method to impose virtual origins, relating the velocity components to their respective wall-normal gradients linearly. Our results suggest that the effect of virtual origins on the flow, and hence the change in drag that they produce, can be reduced to an offset between the virtual origin perceived by the mean flow and that perceived by the overlying turbulence, and that turbulence remains otherwise smooth-wall-like, as proposed by Luchini (1996). The origin for turbulence, however, would not be set by the spanwise virtual origin alone, but by a combination of the spanwise and wall-normal origins. These observations suggest the need for an extension of Luchini’s virtual-origin theory to predict the change in drag, accounting for the wall-normal transpiration when its effect is not negligible
Turbulent drag reduction by anisotropic permeable substrates-analysis and direct numerical simulations
We explore the ability of anisotropic permeable substrates to reduce
turbulent skin-friction, studying the influence that these substrates have on
the overlying turbulence. For this, we perform DNSs of channel flows bounded by
permeable substrates. The results confirm theoretical predictions, and the
resulting drag curves are similar to those of riblets. For small
permeabilities, the drag reduction is proportional to the difference between
the streamwise and spanwise permeabilities. This linear regime breaks down for
a critical value of the wall-normal permeability, beyond which the performance
begins to degrade. We observe that the degradation is associated with the
appearance of spanwise-coherent structures, attributed to a
Kelvin-Helmholtz-like instability of the mean flow. This feature is common to a
variety of obstructed flows, and linear stability analysis can be used to
predict it. For large permeabilities, these structures become prevalent in the
flow, outweighing the drag-reducing effect of slip and eventually leading to an
increase of drag. For the substrate configurations considered, the largest drag
reduction observed is at a friction Reynolds number
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Modulation of near-wall turbulence in the transitionally rough regime
Direct numerical simulations of turbulent channels with rough walls are
conducted in the transitionally rough regime. The effect that roughness
produces on the overlying turbulence is studied using a modified triple
decomposition of the flow. This decomposition separates the roughness-induced
contribution from the background turbulence, with the latter essentially free
of any texture footprint. For small roughness, the background turbulence is not
significantly altered, but merely displaced closer to the roughness crests,
with the change in drag being proportional to this displacement. As the
roughness size increases, the background turbulence begins to be modified,
notably by the increase of energy for short, wide wavelengths, which is
consistent with the appearance of a shear-flow instability of the mean flow. A
laminar model is presented to estimate the roughness-coherent contribution, as
well as the displacement height and the velocity at the roughness crests. Based
on the effects observed in the background turbulence, the roughness function is
decomposed into different terms to analyse different contributions to the
change in drag, laying the foundations for a predictive model
Geometry-induced fluctuations in the transitionally rough regime
Direct numerical simulations of turbulent flows over rough surfaces are conducted to investigate the physics of the transitionally rough regime. Different roughness sizes are analysed within the transitional regime, while keeping the shape of the surface geometry constant. To study the effect of roughness on the flow field, a novel decomposition is used to divide the velocity into two components: a turbulent, geometry-independent contribution, and a geometry-induced contribution, whose intensity is modulated by the overlying turbulence. In the onset of the transitionally rough regime, the turbulent component remains essentially unmodified, and it is anticipated that all the roughness effects can be attributed entirely to the geometry-induced fluctuations. As the roughness size increases further, the turbulent component is also modified, and the fluid-surface interaction becomes more complex.This work was supported by the European Research Council through the II Multiflow Summer Workshop, and by the British Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council through grant number EP/M506485/1
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