Effects of Aspect Ratio on Higher-Order Moments, Conditional Statistics, TKE Budget and Anisotropy in Narrow Open Channel Flow

The paper investigates the influence of aspect ratio on the higher-order statistics of velocity fluctuations in hydraulically rough narrow OCF. In the experiments, the aspect ratios were varied between 2.5 and 4. Velocities were measured with ADV. The third-order moments were found to be sensitive to the aspect ratio in the outer region. The contributions of all quadrant events are approximately equal in lower aspect ratio flows, whereas ejections and sweeps are the dominant as the aspect ratio increases. The upward transfer of TKE flux increases in the outer layer with increase in aspect ratio. The TKE production and dissipation are found to be dependent on the aspect ratio. The analysis of Reynolds stress AIM reveals that for low aspect ratio flows turbulence tends to attain rod like axisymmetric turbulence only in the intermediate layer whereas for higher aspect ratio, turbulence attains rod like axisymmetric turbulence throughout the depth.

The Effect of Habitat Structure Boulder Spacing on Near-Bed Shear Stress and Turbulent Events in a Gravel Bed Channel

This study experimentally investigated the effect of boulder spacing and boulder submergence ratio on the near-bed shear stress in a single array of boulders in a gravel bed open channel flume. An acoustic Doppler velocimeter (ADV) was used to measure the instantaneous three-dimensional velocity components. Four methods of estimating near-bed shear stress were compared. The results suggested a significant effect of boulder spacing and boulder submergence ratio on the near-bed shear stress estimations and their spatial distributions. It was found that at unsubmerged condition, the turbulent kinetic energy (TKE) and modified TKE methods can be used interchangeably to estimate the near-bed shear stress. At both submerged and unsubmerged conditions, the Reynolds method performed differently from the other point-methods. Moreover, a quadrant analysis was performed to examine the turbulent events and their contribution to the near-bed Reynolds shear stress with the effect of boulder spacing. Generally, the burst events (ejections and sweeps) were reduced in the presence of boulders. This study may improve the understanding of the effect of the boulder spacing and boulder submergence ratio on the near-bed shear stress estimations of stream restoration practices.

Shoaling Waves Interacting with an Orthogonal Current

In the present work, an experimental investigation on the hydrodynamics of shoaling waves superposed on a steady orthogonal current is carried out. An experimental campaign in a wave tank has been performed, with waves and current interacting at a right angle over a sloping planar beach. Velocity data have been gathered during the experiments in order to investigate mean, phase and turbulent flow. A detailed preliminary analysis of the time- and space-variability of the experiments is presented. Results show that a complex interaction between waves and current occurs as the wave shoals, in terms of sheer production, momentum transfer and turbulent mixing. Superposition of waves determines a shear increase at the bottom due to an enhanced turbulence mixing, nonetheless as depth decreases and the current velocity consequently increases, shoaling waves may be less efficient in enhancing shear at the bottom. Moreover, the superposition of waves determines the current to oscillate around its mean velocity value. Nevertheless, as wave shoals and simultaneously current velocity increases with decreasing depth, waves and current oscillatory motion experience a phase lag, as a response of the larger momentum of the current to the changing of the shoaling waves acceleration distribution along the wave phase. Moreover, the turbulent bursting events of the combined flow in proximity of the bed have been investigated by means of quadrant analysis, showing an increase of the turbulent ejections and sweeps due to the superposition of the shoaling waves.

Laminarisation of flow at low Reynolds number due to streamwise body force

It is well established that when a turbulent flow is subjected to a non-uniform body force, the turbulence may be significantly suppressed in comparison with that of the flow of the same flow rate and hence the flow is said to be laminarised. This is the situation in buoyancy-aided mixed convection when severe heat transfer deterioration may occur. Here we report results of direct numerical simulations of flow with a linear or a step-change profile of body force. In contrast to the conventional view, we show that applying a body force to a turbulent flow while keeping the pressure force unchanged causes little changes to the key characteristics of the turbulence. In particular, the mixing characteristics of the turbulence represented by the turbulent viscosity remain largely unaffected. The so-called flow laminarisation due to a body force is in effect a reduction in the apparent Reynolds number of the flow, based on an apparent friction velocity associated with only the pressure force of the flow (i.e. excluding the contribution of the body force). The new understanding allows the level of the flow ‘laminarisation’ and when the full laminarisation occurs to be readily predicted. In terms of the near-wall turbulence structure, the numbers of ejections and sweeps are little influenced by the imposition of the body force, whereas the strength of each event may be enhanced if the coverage of the body force extends significantly away from the wall. The streamwise turbulent stress is usually increased in accordance with the observation of more and stronger elongated streaks, but the wall-normal and the circumferential turbulent stresses are largely unchanged.

Probability distribution of turbulence in curvilinear cross section mobile bed channel

The present study investigates the probability density functions (PDFs) of two-dimensional turbulent velocity fluctuations, Reynolds shear stress (RSS) and conditional RSSs in threshold channel obtained by using Gram–Charlier (GC) series. The GC series expansion has been used up to the moments of order four to include the skewness and kurtosis. Experiments were carried out in the curvilinear cross section sand bed channel at threshold condition with uniform sand size of d50 = 0.418 mm. The result concludes that the PDF distributions of turbulent velocity fluctuations and RSS calculated theoretically based on GC series expansion satisfied the PDFs obtained from the experimental data. The PDF distribution of conditional RSSs related to the ejections and sweeps are well represented by the GC series exponential distribution, except that a slight departure of inward and outward interactions is observed, which may be due to weaker events. This paper offers some new insights into the probabilistic mechanism of sediment transport, which can be helpful in sediment management and design of curvilinear cross section mobile bed channel.

On the Lamb vector divergence in Navier–Stokes flows

The mathematical and physical properties of the Lamb vector divergence are explored. Toward this aim, the instantaneous and mean dynamics of the Lamb vector divergence are examined in several analytic and turbulent flow examples relative to its capacity to identify and characterize spatially localized motions having a distinct capacity to effect a time rate of change of momentum. In this context, the transport equation for the Lamb vector divergence is developed and shown to accurately describe the dynamical mechanisms by which adjacent high- and low-momentum fluid parcels interact to effect a time rate of change of momentum and generate forces such as drag. From this, a transport-equation-based framework is developed that captures the self-sustaining spatiotemporal interactions between coherent motions, e.g. ejections and sweeps in turbulent wall flows, as predicted by the binary source–sink distribution of the Lamb vector divergence. New insight into coherent motion development and evolution is found through the analysis of the Lamb vector divergence.

Structure of turbulent flow over regular arrays of cubical roughness

The structure of turbulent flow over large roughness consisting of regular arrays of cubical obstacles is investigated numerically under constant pressure gradient conditions. Results are analysed in terms of first- and second-order statistics, by visualization of instantaneous flow fields and by conditional averaging. The accuracy of the simulations is established by detailed comparisons of first- and second-order statistics with wind-tunnel measurements. Coherent structures in the log region are investigated. Structure angles are computed from two-point correlations, and quadrant analysis is performed to determine the relative importance of Q2 and Q4 events (ejections and sweeps) as a function of height above the roughness. Flow visualization shows the existence of low-momentum regions (LMRs) as well as vortical structures throughout the log layer. Filtering techniques are used to reveal instantaneous examples of the association of the vortices with the LMRs, and linear stochastic estimation and conditional averaging are employed to deduce their statistical properties. The conditional averaging results reveal the presence of LMRs and regions of Q2 and Q4 events that appear to be associated with hairpin-like vortices, but a quantitative correspondence between the sizes of the vortices and those of the LMRs is difficult to establish; a simple estimate of the ratio of the vortex width to the LMR width gives a value that is several times larger than the corresponding ratio over smooth walls. The shape and inclination of the vortices and their spatial organization are compared to recent findings over smooth walls. Characteristic length scales are shown to scale linearly with height in the log region. Whilst there are striking qualitative similarities with smooth walls, there are also important differences in detail regarding: (i) structure angles and sizes and their dependence on distance from the rough surface; (ii) the flow structure close to the roughness; (iii) the roles of inflows into and outflows from cavities within the roughness; (iv) larger vortices on the rough wall compared to the smooth wall; (v) the effect of the different generation mechanism at the wall in setting the scales of structures.

Bursts and the law of the wall in turbulent boundary layers

The bursting mechanism in two different high-Reynolds-number boundary layers has been analysed by means of conditional sampling. One boundary layer develops on a smooth, flat plate in zero pressure gradient; the other, also in zero pressure gradient, is perturbed by a rough-to-smooth change in surface roughness and the new internal layer has not yet recovered to the local equilibrium condition at the measurement station. Sampling on the instantaneous uv signal in the logarithmic region confirms the presence of two related structures, ‘ejections’ and ‘sweeps’ which, in the smooth-wall layer, appear to be responsible for most of the turbulent energy production, and to effect virtually all that part of the spectral energy transfer that is universal. Ejections show features similar to those of Falco's ‘typical eddies’ while sweeps appear to be inverted ejections moving down towards the wall. The inertial structures associated with ejections show attributes of the true universal motion (Townsend's ‘attached’ eddies) of the inner layer and these are therefore identified as ‘bursts’. In the outer layer, these become ‘detached’ from the wall. The large-scale structures associated with sweeps also appear to be ‘detached’ eddies (‘splats’), but these induce low-wave-number inactive motion near the wall and this is not universal even though the sweep itself is. Neither ejections nor sweeps detected in the rough-to-smooth layer are near a condition of energy equilibrium. The relation of ejections and sweeps to the law of the wall and other accepted laws is discussed.