Sound generation mechanism of compressible vortex reconnection

We study the sound generation mechanism of initially subsonic viscous vortex reconnection at vortex Reynolds number $Re~(\equiv \text {circulation}/\text {kinematic viscosity})=1500$ through decomposition of Lighthill's acoustic source term. The Laplacian of the kinetic energy, flexion product, enstrophy and deviation from the isentropic condition provide the dominant contributions to the acoustic source term. The overall (all time) extrema of the total source term and its dominant hydrodynamic components scale linearly with the reference Mach number $M_o$ ; the deviation from the isentropic condition shows a quadratic scaling. The significant sound arising from the flexion product occurs due to the coiling and uncoiling of the twisted vortex filaments wrapping around the bridges, when a rapid strain is induced on the filaments by the repulsion of the bridges. The spatial distributions of the various acoustic source terms reveal the importance of mutual cancellations among most of the terms; this also highlights the importance of symmetry breaking in the sound generation during reconnection. Compressibility acts to delay the start of the sequence of reconnection events, as long as shocklets, if formed, are sufficiently weak to not affect the reconnection. The delayed onset has direct ramifications for the sound generation by enhancing the velocity of the entrained jet between the vortices and increasing the spatial gradients of the acoustic source terms. Consistent with the near-field pressure, the overall maximum instantaneous sound pressure level in the far field has a quadratic dependence on $M_o$ . Thus, reconnection becomes an even more dominant sound-generating event at higher $M_o$ .

Vortex reconnections in classical and quantum fluids

We review recent rigorous results on the phenomenon of vortex reconnection in classical and quantum fluids. In the context of the Navier–Stokes equations in $$\mathbb {T}^3$$ T 3 we show the existence of global smooth solutions that exhibit creation and destruction of vortex lines of arbitrarily complicated topologies. Concerning quantum fluids, we prove that for any initial and final configurations of quantum vortices, and any way of transforming one into the other, there is an initial condition whose associated solution to the Gross–Pitaevskii equation realizes this specific vortex reconnection scenario. Key to prove these results is an inverse localization principle for Beltrami fields and a global approximation theorem for the linear Schrödinger equation.

Numerical study of the vortex breakdown and vortex reconnection in the flow path of high-pressure water turbine

The paper presents a study of the instability of the precessing vortex core in the model of the draft tube of a hydraulic turbine. The study was carried out using numerical modeling using various approaches: URANS, RSM, LES. The best agreement with the experimental data was shown by the RSM and LES methods with the modelling of the runner rotation by the sliding mesh method. In the regime under consideration, the precessing vortex rope is subject to instability, which leads to reconnection of its turns and the formation of an isolated vortex ring. Reconnection of the vortex core leads to aperiodic and intense pressure fluctuations recorded on the diffuser wall.

Hydrodynamics of the Wake of Contra-Rotating Propellers at Different Loading Conditions

This work presents an experimental study of the wake hydrodynamics of a three-blade contra-rotating propeller system (CRP) at advance ratio J = 0.7, 1 and 1.3. The study is carried out in a cavitation tunnel by employing a mixed hardware-software phase-locked acquisition and processing scheme. Flow measurements are thus phase-averaged based on both the forward and aft propeller angular position, so that the effect of their relative position on the flow features is investigated. Average and fluctuating velocity fields along with vorticity are presented and discussed. Strong interactions take place between the forward and aft propellers’ trailing vorticity with regular patterns of vortex reconnection and break-up which depend on the advance coefficient. Flow visualizations, carried out by inducing cavitation in the vortex cores, show that complex though organized patterns of helical coaxial vorticity occur within the wake.