dorsal/arxiv
View SchemaFluid Particle Accelerations in Fully Developed Turbulence
| Authors | A. La Porta, Greg A. Voth, Alice M. Crawford, Jim Alexander, Eberhard Bodenschatz |
|---|---|
| Categories | |
| ArXiv ID | physics/0011017 |
| URL | https://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0011017 |
| DOI | 10.1038/35059027 |
Abstract
The motion of fluid particles as they are pushed along erratic trajectories by fluctuating pressure gradients is fundamental to transport and mixing in turbulence. It is essential in cloud formation and atmospheric transport, processes in stirred chemical reactors and combustion systems, and in the industrial production of nanoparticles. The perspective of particle trajectories has been used successfully to describe mixing and transport in turbulence, but issues of fundamental importance remain unresolved. One such issue is the Heisenberg-Yaglom prediction of fluid particle accelerations, based on the 1941 scaling theory of Kolmogorov (K41). Here we report acceleration measurements using a detector adapted from high-energy physics to track particles in a laboratory water flow at Reynolds numbers up to 63,000. We find that universal K41 scaling of the acceleration variance is attained at high Reynolds numbers. Our data show strong intermittency---particles are observed with accelerations of up to 1,500 times the acceleration of gravity (40 times the root mean square value). Finally, we find that accelerations manifest the anisotropy of the large scale flow at all Reynolds numbers studied.
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"abstract": "The motion of fluid particles as they are pushed along erratic trajectories\nby fluctuating pressure gradients is fundamental to transport and mixing in\nturbulence. It is essential in cloud formation and atmospheric transport,\nprocesses in stirred chemical reactors and combustion systems, and in the\nindustrial production of nanoparticles. The perspective of particle\ntrajectories has been used successfully to describe mixing and transport in\nturbulence, but issues of fundamental importance remain unresolved. One such\nissue is the Heisenberg-Yaglom prediction of fluid particle accelerations,\nbased on the 1941 scaling theory of Kolmogorov (K41). Here we report\nacceleration measurements using a detector adapted from high-energy physics to\ntrack particles in a laboratory water flow at Reynolds numbers up to 63,000. We\nfind that universal K41 scaling of the acceleration variance is attained at\nhigh Reynolds numbers. Our data show strong intermittency---particles are\nobserved with accelerations of up to 1,500 times the acceleration of gravity\n(40 times the root mean square value). Finally, we find that accelerations\nmanifest the anisotropy of the large scale flow at all Reynolds numbers\nstudied.",
"arxiv_id": "physics/0011017",
"authors": [
"A. La Porta",
"Greg A. Voth",
"Alice M. Crawford",
"Jim Alexander",
"Eberhard Bodenschatz"
],
"categories": [
"physics.flu-dyn"
],
"doi": "10.1038/35059027",
"title": "Fluid Particle Accelerations in Fully Developed Turbulence",
"url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0011017"
},
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