scholarly journals Wall-Normal Variation of Spanwise Streak Spacing in Turbulent Boundary Layer With Low-to-Moderate Reynolds Number

Entropy ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wenkang Wang ◽  
Chong Pan ◽  
Jinjun Wang

Low-speed streaks in wall-bounded turbulence are the dominant structures in the near-wall turbulent self-sustaining cycle. Existing studies have well characterized their spanwise spacing in the buffer layer and below. Recent studies suggested the existence of these small-scale structures in the higher layer where large-scale structures usually receive more attention. The present study is thus devoted to extending the understanding of the streak spacing to the log layer. An analysis is taken on two-dimensional (2D) wall-parallel velocity fields in a smooth-wall turbulent boundary layer with Ret = 4402400, obtained via either 2D Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) measurement taken here or public Direct Numerical Simulation (DNS). Morphological-based streak identification analysis yields a Re-independent log-normal distribution of the streak spacing till the upper bound of the log layer, based on which an empirical model is proposed to account for its wall-normal growth. The small-scale part of the spanwise spectra of the streamwise fluctuating velocity below y? = 100 is reasonably restored by a synthetic simulation that distributes elementary streak units based on the proposed empirical streak spacing model, which highlights the physical significance of streaks in shaping the small-scale part of the velocity spectra beyond the buffer layer.

1995 ◽  
Vol 286 ◽  
pp. 137-171 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen R. Snarski ◽  
Richard M. Lueptow

Measurements of wall pressure and streamwise velocity fluctuations in a turbulent boundary layer on a cylinder in an axial air flow (δ/a = 5.04, Reθ = 2870) have been used to investigate the turbulent flow structures in the cylindrical boundary layer that contribute to the fluctuating pressure at the wall in an effort to deduce the effect of transverse curvature on the structure of boundary layer turbulence. Wall pressure was measured at a single location with a subminiature electret condenser microphone, and the velocity was measured throughout a large volume of the boundary layer with a hotwire probe. Auto- and cross-spectral densities, cross-correlations, and conditional sampling of the pressure and streamwise velocity indicate that two primary groups of flow disturbances contribute to the fluctuating pressure at the wall: (i) low-frequency large-scale structures with dynamical significance across the entire boundary layer that are consistent with a pair of large-scale spanwise-oriented counter-rotating vortices and (ii) higher frequency small-scale disturbances concentrated close to the wall that are associated with the burst-sweep cycle and are responsible for the short-duration large-amplitude wall pressure fluctuations. A bidirectional relationship was found to exist between both positive and negative pressure peaks and the temporal derivative of u near the wall. Because the frequency of the large-scale disturbance observed across the boundary layer is consistent with the bursting frequency deduced from the average time between bursts, the burst-sweep cycle appears to be linked to the outer motion. A stretching of the large-scale structures very near the wall, as suggested by space-time correlation convection velocity results, may provide the coupling mechanism. Since the high-frequency disturbance observed near the wall is consistent with the characteristic frequency deduced from the average duration of bursting events, the bursting process provides the two characteristic time scales responsible for the bimodal distribution of energy near the wall. Because many of the observed structural features of the cylindrical boundary layer are similar to those observed in flat-plate turbulent boundary layers, transverse curvature appears to have little effect on the fundamental turbulent structure of the boundary layer for the moderate transverse curvature ratio used in this investigation. From differences that exist between the turbulence intensity, skewness, and spectra of the streamwise velocity, however, it appears that transverse curvature may enhance (i.e. energize) the large-scale motion owing to the reduced constraint imposed on the flow by the smaller cylindrical wall.


The viscosity-dominated unsteady flow in a row of small transverse square cavities lying submerged in a turbulent boundary layer is first considered. Experiments performed primarily with one size of cavities show that the cavity flow can be excited by freestream disturbances in a narrow frequency band that is independent of the flow speed. The turbulent boundary layer in which the cavities are submerged remains transparent to the disturbances. The cavity flow resonates when the depths of the cavity and the Stokes layer are nearly the same, that is when 2π fk 2 / v = 1, where f is the frequency of the resonant cavity flow, k is the cavity height and v is the kinematic viscosity of the fluid. An associated laminar boundary-layer excitation experiment shows that the instability process over the grooved surface also involves the amplification of Tollmien–Schlichting (T–S) waves in much the same manner as in a smooth-wall Blasius profile but the grooves enhance receptivity. A theory is given proposing that the resonant groove flow in the low Reynolds number turbulent boundary layer is driven by highly amplified matched T–S waves. The possible relevance of the observed coupling between the large-scale freestream disturbances and the small-scale cavity flows to the turbulence production mechanism in a smooth flat-plate turbulent boundary layer is also discussed.


2019 ◽  
Vol 865 ◽  
pp. 1085-1109 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yutaro Motoori ◽  
Susumu Goto

To understand the generation mechanism of a hierarchy of multiscale vortices in a high-Reynolds-number turbulent boundary layer, we conduct direct numerical simulations and educe the hierarchy of vortices by applying a coarse-graining method to the simulated turbulent velocity field. When the Reynolds number is high enough for the premultiplied energy spectrum of the streamwise velocity component to show the second peak and for the energy spectrum to obey the$-5/3$power law, small-scale vortices, that is, vortices sufficiently smaller than the height from the wall, in the log layer are generated predominantly by the stretching in strain-rate fields at larger scales rather than by the mean-flow stretching. In such a case, the twice-larger scale contributes most to the stretching of smaller-scale vortices. This generation mechanism of small-scale vortices is similar to the one observed in fully developed turbulence in a periodic cube and consistent with the picture of the energy cascade. On the other hand, large-scale vortices, that is, vortices as large as the height, are stretched and amplified directly by the mean flow. We show quantitative evidence of these scale-dependent generation mechanisms of vortices on the basis of numerical analyses of the scale-dependent enstrophy production rate. We also demonstrate concrete examples of the generation process of the hierarchy of multiscale vortices.


2015 ◽  
Vol 767 ◽  
Author(s):  
Subrahmanyam Duvvuri ◽  
Beverley J. McKeon

AbstractA formal relationship between the skewness and the correlation coefficient of large and small scales, termed the amplitude modulation coefficient, is established for a general statistically stationary signal and is analysed in the context of a turbulent velocity signal. Both the quantities are seen to be measures of phase in triadically consistent interactions between scales of turbulence. The naturally existing phase relationships between large and small scales in a turbulent boundary layer are then manipulated by exciting a synthetic large-scale motion in the flow using a spatially impulsive dynamic wall roughness perturbation. The synthetic scale is seen to alter the phase relationships, or the degree of modulation, in a quasi-deterministic manner by exhibiting a phase-organizing influence on the small scales. The results presented provide encouragement for the development of a practical framework for favourable manipulation of energetic small-scale turbulence through large-scale inputs in a wall-bounded turbulent flow.


1994 ◽  
Vol 259 ◽  
pp. 345-373 ◽  
Author(s):  
ROY Y. Myose ◽  
Ron F. Blackwelder

The dynamics and interaction of turbulent-boundary-layer eddy structures was experimentally emulated. Counter-rotating streamwise vortices and low-speed streaks emulating turbulent-boundary-layer wall eddies were generated by a Görtler instability mechanism. Large-scale motions associated with the outer region of turbulent boundary layer were emulated with — ωzspanwise vortical eddies shed by a periodic non-sinusoidal oscillation of an airfoil. The scales of the resulting eddy structures were comparable to a moderate-Reynolds-number turbulent boundary layer. Results show that the emulated wall-eddy breakdown was triggered by streamwise acceleration associated with the outer region of turbulent boundary layer. This breakdown involved violent mixing between low-speed fluid from the wall eddy and accelerated fluid associated with the outer structure. Although wall eddies can break down autonomously, the presence of and interaction with outer-region — ωzeddies hastened their breakdown. Increasing the — ωzeddy strength resulted in further hastening of the breakdown. Conversely, + ωzeddies were found to delay wall-eddy breakdown locally, with further delays resulting from stronger + ωzeddies. This suggests that the outer region of turbulent boundary layers plays a role in the bursting process.


1997 ◽  
Vol 342 ◽  
pp. 263-293 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. S. SHAFI ◽  
R. A. ANTONIA

Measurements of the spanwise and wall-normal components of vorticity and their constituent velocity derivative fluctuations have been made in a turbulent boundary layer over a mesh-screen rough wall using a four-hot-wire vorticity probe. The measured spectra and variances of vorticity and velocity derivatives have been corrected for the effect of spatial resolution. The high-wavenumber behaviour of the spectra conforms closely with isotropy. Over most of the outer layer, the normalized magnitudes of the velocity derivative variances differ significantly from those over a smooth wall layer. The differences are such that the variances are much more nearly isotropic over the rough wall than on the smooth wall. This behaviour is consistent with earlier observations that the large-scale structure in this rough wall layer is more isotropic than that in a smooth wall layer. Isotropy-based approximations for the mean energy dissipation rate and mean enstrophy are consequently more reliable in this rough wall layer than in a smooth wall layer. In the outer layer, the vorticity variances are slightly larger than those over a smooth wall; reflecting structural differences between the two flows.


1990 ◽  
Vol 211 ◽  
pp. 285-307 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emerick M. Fernando ◽  
Alexander J. Smits

This investigation describes the effects of an adverse pressure gradient on a flat plate supersonic turbulent boundary layer (Mf ≈ 2.9, βx ≈ 5.8, Reθ, ref ≈ 75600). Single normal hot wires and crossed wires were used to study the Reynolds stress behaviour, and the features of the large-scale structures in the boundary layer were investigated by measuring space–time correlations in the normal and spanwise directions. Both the mean flow and the turbulence were strongly affected by the pressure gradient. However, the turbulent stress ratios showed much less variation than the stresses, and the essential nature of the large-scale structures was unaffected by the pressure gradient. The wall pressure distribution in the current experiment was designed to match the pressure distribution on a previously studied curved-wall model where streamline curvature acted in combination with bulk compression. The addition of streamline curvature affects the turbulence strongly, although its influence on the mean velocity field is less pronounced and the modifications to the skin-friction distribution seem to follow the empirical correlations developed by Bradshaw (1974) reasonably well.


2019 ◽  
Vol 875 ◽  
pp. 1175-1203 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wenjie Zheng ◽  
Shanxin Ruan ◽  
Yue Yang ◽  
Lin He ◽  
Shiyi Chen

We develop a model of the skin-friction coefficient based on scalar images in the compressible, spatially evolving boundary-layer transition. The images are extracted from a passive scalar field by a sliding window filter on the streamwise and wall-normal plane. The multi-scale and multi-directional geometric analysis is applied to characterize the averaged inclination angle of spatially evolving filtered component fields at different scales ranging from a boundary-layer thickness to several viscous length scales. In general, the averaged inclination angles increase along the streamwise direction, and the variation of the angles for large-scale structures is smaller than that for small-scale structures. Inspired by the coincidence of the increasing averaged inclination angle and the rise of the skin-friction coefficient, we propose a simple image-based model of the skin-friction coefficient. The model blends empirical formulae of the skin-friction coefficient in laminar and fully developed turbulent regions using the normalized averaged inclination angle of scalar structures at intermediate and small scales. The model prediction calculated from scalar images is validated by the results from the direct numerical simulation at two Mach numbers, 2.25 and 6, and the relative error can be less than 15 %.


2018 ◽  
Vol 844 ◽  
pp. 635-668 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sichao Deng ◽  
Chong Pan ◽  
Jinjun Wang ◽  
Guosheng He

The present study is devoted to characterizing the coherent organization of vortical structures, which can be fitted into the paradigm of the hairpin-packet model, in the streamwise–wall-normal plane of a canonical turbulent boundary layer at $Re_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D70F}}=377{-}1093$. Proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) of the planar velocity fields measured via two-dimensional particle image velocimetry, together with a spatio-temporal coherence analysis, shows that the first four leading-order POD modes share both geometric similarity and dynamic coherence and jointly depict the downstream convection of the large-scale Q2/Q4 events, which can be regarded as the low-order imprints of the hairpin packets. A simple low-order indicator is then proposed to extract the inclined interfaces of the hairpin packets, based on which a two-point conditional correlation analysis forms a statistical picture of the spatial organization of multiple prograde vortices aligned along the interface within one packet. A saturation of the self-similar growth of the streamwise gap between two neighbouring vortices is seen. This implies a detachment of the hairpin packets from the inner layer. Both the detachment height and the saturated streamwise spacing are found to scale as $Re_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D70F}}^{1/2}$.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document