Direct numerical simulation (DNS) of the near-field of a three-dimensional spatially-developing turbulent ethylene jet flame in highly-heated coflow is performed with a reduced mechanism to determine the stabilization mechanism. The DNS was performed at a jet Reynolds number of 10,000 with over 1.29 billion grid points. The results show that auto-ignition in a fuel-lean mixture at the flame base is the main source of stabilization of the lifted jet flame. The Damko¨ hler number and chemical explosive mode (CEM) analysis also verify that auto-ignition occurs at the flame base. In addition to auto-ignition, Lagrangian tracking of the flame base reveals the passage of large-scale flow structures and their correlation with the fluctuations of the flame base similar to a previous study (Yoo et al., J. Fluid Mech. 640 (2009) 53–481) with hydrogen/air jet flames. It is also observed that the present lifted flame base exhibits a cyclic ‘saw-tooth’ shaped movement marked by rapid movement upstream and slower movement downstream.This is a consequence of the lifted flame being stabilized by a balance between consecutive auto-ignition events in hot fuel-lean mixtures and convection induced by the high-speed jet and coflow velocities. This is confirmed by Lagrangian tracking of key variables including the flame-normal velocity, displacement speed, scalar dissipation rate, and mixture fraction at the stabilization point
