On the non-local geometry of turbulence

A multi-scale methodology for the study of the non-local geometry of eddy structures in turbulence is developed. Starting from a given three-dimensional field, this consists of three main steps: extraction, characterization and classification of structures. The extraction step is done in two stages. First, a multi-scale decomposition based on the curvelet transform is applied to the full three-dimensional field, resulting in a finite set of component three-dimensional fields, one per scale. Second, by iso-contouring each component field at one or more iso-contour levels, a set of closed iso-surfaces is obtained that represents the structures at that scale. The characterization stage is based on the joint probability density function (p.d.f.), in terms of area coverage on each individual iso-surface, of two differential-geometry properties, the shape index and curvedness, plus the stretching parameter, a dimensionless global invariant of the surface. Taken together, this defines the geometrical signature of the iso-surface. The classification step is based on the construction of a finite set of parameters, obtained from algebraic functions of moments of the joint p.d.f. of each structure, that specify its location as a point in a multi-dimensional ‘feature space’. At each scale the set of points in feature space represents all structures at that scale, for the specified iso-contour value. This then allows the application, to the set, of clustering techniques that search for groups of structures with a common geometry. Results are presented of a first application of this technique to a passive scalar field obtained from 5123 direct numerical simulation of scalar mixing by forced, isotropic turbulence (Reλ = 265). These show transition, with decreasing scale, from blob-like structures in the larger scales to blob- and tube-like structures with small or moderate stretching in the inertial range of scales, and then toward tube and, predominantly, sheet-like structures with high level of stretching in the dissipation range of scales. Implications of these results for the dynamical behaviour of passive scalar stirring and mixing by turbulence are discussed

Conceptual design of the EU-DEMO dual coolant lithium lead equatorial module

© 20xx IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works.Within the framework of EUROfusion Program, the Dual Coolant Lithium Lead (DCLL) is one of the four EU breeder blanket concepts that are being investigated as candidates for DEMO. DCLL uses PbLi as the main coolant, tritium breeder, tritium carrier, and neutron multiplier. The main structures, including the first wall, are cooled with helium. The EU program proposed for the next years will consider a DCLL version limited to 550 °C in order to allow the use of conventional materials and technologies. During the first year of EUROfusion activities, a draft design of the DCLL has been proposed. The main blanket performances were adapted to the new specifications and the CAD model of DEMO. The breeder zone has been toroidally divided into four parallel PbLi circuits, separated through stiffening grid radial walls. The PbLi flow routing has been designed to maximize the amount of thermal power extracted by flowing PbLi and to avoid the occurrence of reverse flows due to volumetric heating. Thermal hydraulics, magnetohydrodynamic and neutronics calculations have been performed for the first draft design. The new DCLL design employs Eurofer-alumina-Eurofer sandwich as flow channel insert (FCI).Postprint (published version

New gamma/hadron separation parameters for a neural network for HAWC

The High-Altitude Water Cherenkov experiment (HAWC) observatory is located 4100 meters above sea level. HAWC is able to detect secondary particles from extensive air showers (EAS) initiated in the interaction of a primary particle (either a gamma or a charged cosmic ray) with the upper atmosphere. Because an overwhelming majority of EAS events are triggered by cosmic rays, background noise suppression plays an important role in the data analysis process of the HAWC observatory. Currently, HAWC uses cuts on two parameters (whose values depend on the spatial distribution and luminosity of an event) to separate gamma-ray events from background hadronic showers. In this work, a search for additional gamma-hadron separation parameters was conducted to improve the efficiency of the HAWC background suppression technique. The best-performing parameters were integrated to a feed-foward Multilayer Perceptron Neural Network (MLP-NN), along with the traditional parameters. Various iterations of MLP-NN's were trained on Monte Carlo data, and tested on Crab data. Preliminary results show that the addition of new parameters can improve the significance of the point source at high-energies (~ TeV), at the expense of slightly worse performance in conventional low-energy bins (~ GeV). Further work is underway to improve the efficiency of the neural network at low energies.Comment: Presented at the 35th International Cosmic Ray Conference (ICRC2017), Bexco, Busan, Korea. See arXiv:1708.02572 for all HAWC contribution

Geometry of enstrophy and dissipation, grid resolution effects and proximity issues in turbulence

We perform a multi-scale non-local geometrical analysis of the structures extracted from the enstrophy and kinetic energy dissipation-rate, instantaneous fields of a numerical database of incompressible homogeneous isotropic turbulence decaying in time obtained by DNS in a periodic box. Three different resolutions are considered: 256^3, 512^3 and 1024^3 grid points, with k_(max)η(overbar) approximately 1, 2 and 4, respectively, the same initial conditions and Re_λ ≈ 77. This allows a comparison of the geometry of the structures obtained for different resolutions. For the highest resolution, structures of enstrophy and dissipation evolve in a continuous distribution from blob-like and moderately stretched tube-like shapes at the large scales to highly stretched sheet-like structures at the small scales. The intermediate scales show a predominance of tube-like structures for both fields, much more pronounced for the enstrophy field. The dissipation field shows a tendency towards structures with lower curvedness than those of the enstrophy, for intermediate and small scales. The 256^3 grid resolution case (k_(max)η(overbar) ≈ 1) was unable to detect the predominance of highly stretched sheet-like structures at the smaller scales in both fields. The same non-local methodology for the study of the geometry of structures, but without the multi-scale decomposition, is applied to two scalar fields used by existing local criteria for the eduction of tube- and sheet-like structures in turbulence, Q and [A_ij]_+, respectively, obtained from invariants of the velocity-gradient tensor and alike in the 1024^3 case. This adds the non-local geometrical characterization and classification to those local criteria, assessing their validity in educing particular geometries. Finally, we introduce a new methodology for the study of proximity issues among structures of different fields, based on geometrical considerations and non-local analysis, by taking into account the spatial extent of the structures. We apply it to the four fields previously studied. Tube-like structures of Q are predominantly surrounded by sheet-like structures of [A_ij]_+, which appear at closer distances. For the enstrophy, tube-like structures at an intermediate scale are primarily surrounded by sheets of smaller scales of the enstrophy and structures of dissipation at the same and smaller scales. A secondary contribution results from tubes of enstrophy at smaller scales appearing at farther distances. Different configurations of composite structures are presented

Multi-scale geometric analysis of Lagrangian structures in isotropic turbulence

We report the multi-scale geometric analysis of Lagrangian structures in forced isotropic turbulence and also with a frozen turbulent field. A particle backward-tracking method, which is stable and topology preserving, was applied to obtain the Lagrangian scalar field φ governed by the pure advection equation in the Eulerian form ∂_tφ + u · ∇φ = 0. The temporal evolution of Lagrangian structures was first obtained by extracting iso-surfaces of φ with resolution 1024^3 at different times, from t = 0 to t = T_e, where T_e is the eddy turnover time. The surface area growth rate of the Lagrangian structure was quantified and the formation of stretched and rolled-up structures was observed in straining regions and stretched vortex tubes, respectively. The multi-scale geometric analysis of Bermejo-Moreno & Pullin (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 603, 2008, p. 101) has been applied to the evolution of φ to extract structures at different length scales and to characterize their non-local geometry in a space of reduced geometrical parameters. In this multi-scale sense, we observe, for the evolving turbulent velocity field, an evolutionary breakdown of initially large-scale Lagrangian structures that first distort and then either themselves are broken down or stretched laterally into sheets. Moreover, after a finite time, this progression appears to be insensible to the form of the initially smooth Lagrangian field. In comparison with the statistical geometry of instantaneous passive scalar and enstrophy fields in turbulence obtained by Bermejo-Moreno & Pullin (2008) and Bermejo-Moreno et al. (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 620, 2009, p. 121), Lagrangian structures tend to exhibit more prevalent sheet-like shapes at intermediate and small scales. For the frozen flow, the Lagrangian field appears to be attracted onto a stream-surface field and it develops less complex multi-scale geometry than found for the turbulent velocity field. In the latter case, there appears to be a tendency for the Lagrangian field to move towards a vortex-surface field of the evolving turbulent flow but this is mitigated by cumulative viscous effects