Non-oscillatory forward-in-time method for incompressible flows

This research extends the capabilities of Non-oscillatory Forward-in-Time (NFT) solvers operating on unstructured meshes to allow for accurate simulation of incompressible turbulent flows. This is achieved by the development of Large Eddy Simulation (LES) and Detached Eddy Simulation (DES) turbulent flow methodologies and the development of parallel option of the flow solver. The effective use of LES and DES requires a development of a subgrid-scale model. Several subgrid-scale models are implemented and studied, and their efficacy is assessed. The NFT solvers employed in this work are based on the Multidimensional Positive Definite Advection Transport Algorithm (MPDATA) that facilitates novel implicit Large Eddy Simulation (ILES) approach to treating turbulence. The flexibility and robustness of the new NFT MPDATA solver are studied and successfully validated using well established benchmarks and concentrate on a flow past a sphere. The flow statistics from the solutions are compared against the existing experimental and numerical data and fully confirm the validity of the approach. The parallel implementation of the flow solver is also documented and verified showing a substantial speedup of computations. The proposed method lays foundations for further studies and developments, especially for exploring the potential of MPDATA in the context of ILES and associated treatments of boundary conditions at solid boundaries

Non-oscillatory forward-in-time integrators for viscous incompressible flows past a sphere

A non-oscillatory forward-in-time (NFT) integrator is developed to provide solutions of the Navier-Stokes equations for incompressible flows. Simulations of flows past a sphere are chosen as a benchmark representative of a class of engineering flows past obstacles. The methodology is further extended to moderate Reynolds number, stably stratified flows under gravity, for Froude numbers that typify the characteristic regimes of natural flows past distinct isolated features of topography in weather and climate models. The key elements of the proposed method consist of the Multidimensional Positive Definite Advection Transport Algorithm (MPDATA) and a robust non-symmetric Krylov-subspace elliptic solver. The solutions employ a finite volume spatial discretisation on unstructured and hybrid meshes and benefit from a collocated arrangement of all flow variables while being inherently stable. The development includes the implementation of viscous terms with the detachededdy simulation (DES) approach employed for turbulent flows. Results demonstrate that the proposed methodology enables direct comparisons of the numerical solutions with corresponding laboratory studies of viscous and stratified flows while illustrating accuracy, robustness and flexibility of the NFT schemes. The presented simulations also offer a better insight into stably stratified flows past a sphere