Application of Vorticity Confinement to Turbulence

ORAL

Abstract

The Vorticity Confinement (VC) technique will be described that can accurately and efficiently compute high Reynolds number turbulence. Physically these flows are dominated by thin vortices that can be convected long distances without significant dissipation; VC treats these features as modeled solitary waves directly represented on the computational grid. Another feature of VC is that it contains an immersed boundary model, which allows the simple treatment of complex bodies. The VC method then models the boundary layer, which may separate, over 2-3 grid cells near the surface. VC will be contrasted with conventional Eulerian computational methods. It will be explained how VC, particularly for flows containing treating thin, convecting vortices, eliminates the deficiencies of the conventional methods. Following the description of the model, a sequence of turbulent VC results is presented. First presented is turbulent flow over a cylinder. The cylinder is immersed in a uniform Cartesian grid. Results will be compared against experiments showing the ability of VC to compute the resulting wake despite utilizing a coarse grid. Also present will be a study on the Taylor-Green vortex.

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Authors

  • Nicholas Lynn

    University of Tennessee Space Institute

  • Rebecca Scott

    UCSB, LBNL, NCSU, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Wright State University, Department of Physics, The University of Memphis, TN 38152, North Carolina State University, Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Raleigh, NC, Clemson University, Fisk University, University of North Dakota (Grand Forks), Southern Illinois University, The University of Tennessee Space Institute, SC Governor's School for Science and Mathematics, Francis Marion University, University of North Alabama, Lousiana State University, Department of Physics, Dhaka University, Dhaka, Bangladesh, Head of Government Relations, American Physical Society, Vanderbilt University, Mississippi State University, Emory University, College of William and Mary, University of Tennessee Space Institute, Morehead State University