Patterns in Wall-Bounded Shear Flows

Turbulent–laminar intermittency, typically in the form of bands and spots, is a ubiquitous feature of the route to turbulence in wall-bounded shear flows. Here we study the idealised shear between stress-free boundaries driven by a sinusoidal body force and demonstrate quantitative agreement between turbulence in this flow and that found in the interior of plane Couette flow – the region excluding the boundary layers. Exploiting the absence of boundary layers, we construct a model flow that uses only four Fourier modes in the shear direction and yet robustly captures the range of spatiotemporal phenomena observed in transition, from spot growth to turbulent bands and uniform turbulence. The model substantially reduces the cost of simulating intermittent turbulent structures while maintaining the essential physics and a direct connection to the Navier–Stokes equations. We demonstrate the generic nature of this process by introducing stress-free equivalent flows for plane Poiseuille and pipe flows that again capture the turbulent–laminar structures seen in transition.

Streamwise rolls and accompanying streamwise streaks are ubiquitous in wall-bounded shear flows, both in natural settings, such as the atmospheric boundary layer, as well as in controlled settings, such as laboratory experiments and numerical simulations. The streamwise roll and streak structure has been associated with both transition from the laminar to the turbulent state and with maintenance of the turbulent state. This close association of the streamwise roll and streak structure with the transition to and maintenance of turbulence in wall-bounded shear flow has engendered intense theoretical interest in the dynamics of this structure. In this work, stochastic structural stability theory (SSST) is applied to the problem of understanding the dynamics of the streamwise roll and streak structure. The method of analysis used in SSST comprises a stochastic turbulence model (STM) for the dynamics of perturbations from the streamwise-averaged flow coupled to the associated streamwise-averaged flow dynamics. The result is an autonomous, deterministic, nonlinear dynamical system for evolving a second-order statistical mean approximation of the turbulent state. SSST analysis reveals a robust interaction between streamwise roll and streak structures and turbulent perturbations in which the perturbations are systematically organized through their interaction with the streak to produce Reynolds stresses that coherently force the associated streamwise roll structure. If a critical value of perturbation turbulence intensity is exceeded, this feedback results in modal instability of the combined streamwise roll/streak and associated turbulence complex in the SSST system. In this instability, the perturbations producing the destabilizing Reynolds stresses are predicted by the STM to take the form of oblique structures, which is consistent with observations. In the SSST system this instability exists together with the transient growth process. These processes cooperate in determining the structure of growing streamwise roll and streak. For this reason, comparison of SSST predictions with experiments requires accounting for both the amplitude and structure of initial perturbations as well as the influence of the SSST instability. Over a range of supercritical turbulence intensities in Couette flow, this instability equilibrates to form finite amplitude time-independent streamwise roll and streak structures. At sufficiently high levels of forcing of the perturbation field, equilibration of the streamwise roll and streak structure does not occur and the flow transitions to a time-dependent state. This time-dependent state is self-sustaining in the sense that it persists when the forcing is removed. Moreover, this self-sustaining state rapidly evolves toward a minimal representation of wall-bounded shear flow turbulence in which the dynamics is limited to interaction of the streamwise-averaged flow with a perturbation structure at one streamwise wavenumber. In this minimal realization of the self-sustaining process, the time-dependent streamwise roll and streak structure is maintained by perturbation Reynolds stresses, just as is the case of the time-independent streamwise roll and streak equilibria. However, the perturbation field is maintained not by exogenously forced turbulence, but rather by an endogenous and essentially non-modal parametric growth process that is inherent to time-dependent dynamical systems.

Direct numerical solutions of the three-dimensional time-dependent Navier-Stokes equations are presented for the evolution of three-dimensional finite-amplitude disturbances of plane Poiseuille and plane Couette flows. Spectral methods using Fourier series and Chebyshev polynomial series are used. It is found that plane Poiseuille flow can sustain neutrally stable two-dimensional finite-amplitude disturbances at Reynolds numbers larger than about 2800. No neutrally stable two-dimensional finite-amplitude disturbances of plane Couette flow were found. Three-dimensional disturbances are shown to have a strongly destabilizing effect. It is shown that finite-amplitude disturbances can drive transition to turbulence in both plane Poiseuille flow and plane Couette flow at Reynolds numbers of order 1000. Details of the resulting flow fields are presented. It is also shown that plane Poiseuille flow cannot sustain turbulence at Reynolds numbers below about 500.

Turbulence in wall-bounded shear flow results from a synergistic interaction between linear non-normality and nonlinearity in which non-normal growth of a subset of perturbations configured to transfer energy from the externally forced component of the turbulent state to the perturbation component maintains the perturbation energy, while the subset of energy-transferring perturbations is replenished by nonlinearity. Although it is accepted that both linear non-normality mediated energy transfer from the forced component of the mean flow and nonlinear interactions among perturbations are required to maintain the turbulent state, the detailed physical mechanism by which these processes interact in maintaining turbulence has not been determined. In this work a statistical state dynamics based analysis is performed on turbulent Couette flow at R = 600 and a comparison to DNS is used to demonstrate that the perturbation component in Couette flow turbulence is replenished by a non-normality mediated parametric growth process in which the fluctuating streamwise mean flow has been adjusted to marginal Lyapunov stability. It is further shown that the alternative mechanism in which the subspace of non-normally growing perturbations is maintained directly by perturbation-perturbation nonlinearity does not contribute to maintaining the turbulent state. This work identifies parametric interaction between the fluctuating streamwise mean flow and the streamwise varying perturbations to be the mechanism of the nonlinear interaction maintaining the perturbation component of the turbulent state, and identifies the associated Lyapunov vectors with positive energetics as the structures of the perturbation subspace supporting the turbulence.

Understanding the instability of compressible shear flows is of both academic interest and practical importance for predicting transition in such flows. In this paper, the linear stability of compressible plane Couette flow and Poiseuille flow in temporal mode is revisited, with emphasis on spectrum features of disturbances and dominant instability at different Mach numbers. The disturbance spectra of different discrete modes are presented, including acoustic modes (i.e., even modes II, IV, etc. and odd modes I, III, etc.) and viscous modes. The results show that as wavenumber increases, the even modes are first synchronized with the viscous branch when their phase velocities are a bit larger than zero, and subsequently synchronized with odd modes when their phase velocities coincide with each other. The synchronizations cause branching of the dispersion curves, and the even modes have several maxima of growth rate. The low-wavenumber maximum (with phase velocity close to zero) is associated with viscous instability and the higher-wavenumber maxima correspond to inviscid instability. Depending on the flow parameters, the branching topology may involve multimodes, which is different from the spectrum branching observed in hypersonic boundary layer. In compressible Couette flow, the mode-II viscous and inviscid instabilities dominate the instability at different Mach numbers. In compressible plane Poiseuille flow, multiple instability modes coexist, including the viscous Tollmien-Schlichting (TS) mode, the acoustic viscous instability modes II and IV and acoustic inviscid instability modes I and III. As Mach number increases (i.e., from incompressible to hypersonic), the mode TS, II, IV, and III would successively dominate the Poiseuille-flow instability. These results yield a comprehensive understanding of the disturbance spectrum and modal instability in compressible plane Couette and Poiseuille flows.

The linear, nonlinear and breakdown stages in the transition of localized disturbances in plane Poiseuille flow is studied by direct numerical simulations and analysis of the linearized Navier–Stokes equations. Three-dimensionality plays a key role and allows for algebraic growth of the normal vorticity through the linear lift-up mechanism. This growth primarily generates elongated structures in the streamwise direction since it is largest at low streamwise wavenumbers. For finite-amplitude disturbances such structures will be generated essentially independent of the details of the initial disturbance, since the preferred nonlinear interactions transfer energy to low streamwise wavenumbers. The nonlinear interactions also give a decrease in the spanwise scales. For the stronger initial disturbances the streamwise vorticity associated with the slightly inclined streaks was found to roll up into distinct streamwise vortices in the vicinity of which breakdown occurred. The breakdown starts with a local rapid growth of the normal velocity bringing low-speed fluid out from the wall. This phenomenon is similar to the low-velocity spikes previously observed in transition experiments. Soon thereafter a small turbulent spot is formed. This scenario represents a bypass of the regular Tollmien–Schlichting, secondary instability process. The simulations have been carried out with a sufficient spatial resolution to ensure an accurate description of all stages of the breakdown and spot formation processes. The generality of the observed processes is substantiated by use of different types of initial disturbances and by Blasius boundary-layer simulations. The present results point in the direction of universality of the observed transition mechanisms for localized disturbances in wall-bounded shear flows.

We investigate the nonlinear phase-space dynamics of plane Couette flow and plane Poiseuille flow under the action of opposition control at low Reynolds numbers in domains close to the minimal unit. In Couette flow, the effect of the control is analysed by focussing on a pair of non-trivial equilibrium solutions. It is found that the control only slightly modifies the statistics, turbulent skin friction and phase-space projection of the lower-branch equilibrium solution, which, in this case, is in fact identical to the edge state. On the other hand, the upper-branch equilibrium solution and mean turbulent state are modified considerably when the control is applied. In phase space, they gradually approach the lower-branch equilibrium solution on increasing the control amplitude, and this results in an elevation of the critical Reynolds number at which the equilibrium solutions first occur via a saddle-node bifurcation. It is also found that the upper-branch equilibrium solution is stabilised by the control. In Poiseuille flow, we study an unstable periodic orbit on the edge state and find that it, too, is modified very little by opposition control. We again observe that the turbulent state gradually approaches the edge state in phase space as the control amplitude is increased. In both flows, we find that the control significantly reduces the fluctuating strength of the turbulent state in phase space. However, the reduced distance between the turbulent trajectory and the edge state yields a significant reduction in turbulence lifetimes for both Couette and Poiseuille flow. This demonstrates that opposition control greatly increases the probability of the trajectory escaping from the turbulent state, which takes the form of a chaotic saddle.

In the past, several stability theories have been developed to describe the mechanism of flow instability. These are: (1) The linear stability theory, which can be traced back to Rayleigh (1880) is a widely used method and has been applied to some problems [1]; (2) The energy method (Orr, 1907) based on Orr-Reynolds equations; (3) The weak nonlinear stability theory developed by Stuart and others; (4) The secondary instability theory proposed by Herbert et al. (1988) and his colleagues. However, there are still significant discrepancies between the predictions obtained using these methods and experimental data; particularly at transition. Dou [2,3] proposed a mechanism with the aim to clarify the phenomenon of transition from laminar flow to turbulence for wall-bounded shear flows. In this mechanism, the whole flow field is treated as an energy field. By rigorous derivations based on physics, it is found that that the energy gradient in the transverse direction is able to amplify a velocity disturbance, while the viscous friction loss in the streamwise direction can resist and absorb this disturbance. The flow instability or the transition to turbulence depends on the relative magnitude of these two roles of energy gradient amplification and viscous friction damping of the initial disturbance. The analysis has obtained very good consistent agreement for the plane Poiseuille flow and the pipe Poiseuille flow. This theory is named as “energy gradient theory”. In this theory, the flow instability is characterized by a function K of coordinates and the disturbance amplitude. In this paper, using the energy analysis, the equation for calculating K in plane Couette flow is derived. It is demonstrated that the critical value of K at the critical condition which is observed from experiments [4~6] is about 370 for plane Couette flow. This value is about the same as for plane Poiseuille flow and pipe Poiseuille flow (385~389). These results demonstrate that the critical value of Kmax for wall-bounded parallel flows including both pressure driven and shear driven flows is about 370~389. This consistency also suggests that the mechanisms of instabilities in wall-bounded parallel shear flow are perhaps the same. They are all dominated by the transverse energy gradient and the streamwise flow energy loss. The results obtained in this study provide further basis for better understanding of the mechanism of instability and transition to turbulence in parallel shear flows, and provide a basis for the modelling and prediction of the transition process.

Machine Learning (ML) is becoming increasingly popular in fluid dynamics. Powerful ML algorithms such as neural networks or ensemble methods are notoriously difficult to interpret. Here, we introduce the novel Shapley additive explanations (SHAP) algorithm (Lundberg & Lee, Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems, 2017, pp. 4765–4774), a game-theoretic approach that explains the output of a given ML model in the fluid dynamics context. We give a proof of concept concerning SHAP as an explainable artificial intelligence method providing useful and human-interpretable insight for fluid dynamics. To show that the feature importance ranking provided by SHAP can be interpreted physically, we first consider data from an established low-dimensional model based on the self-sustaining process (SSP) in wall-bounded shear flows, where each data feature has a clear physical and dynamical interpretation in terms of known representative features of the near-wall dynamics, i.e. streamwise vortices, streaks and linear streak instabilities. SHAP determines consistently that only the laminar profile, the streamwise vortex and a specific streak instability play a major role in the prediction. We demonstrate that the method can be applied to larger fluid dynamics datasets by a SHAP evaluation on plane Couette flow in a minimal flow unit focussing on the relevance of streaks and their instabilities for the prediction of relaminarisation events. Here, we find that the prediction is based on proxies for streak modulations corresponding to linear streak instabilities within the SSP. That is, the SHAP analysis suggests that the break-up of the self-sustaining cycle is connected with a suppression of streak instabilities.

Internal flow is a flow for which the fluid is confined by a surface. Hence, the boundary layer is unable to develop without eventually being constrained. An internal flow is constrained by the bounding walls, and the viscous effects will grow and meet and permeate the entire flow. Some examples of internal flows are: flow between two parallel horizontal plates, Couette flow, plane Poiseuille flow, flow through pipes, etc. In the present study, a plane Couette flow has been analyzed by a classical method (exact solution of Navier-Stokes equation) as well as by an approximate method using central difference scheme (numerical solution of Navier-Stokes equation). The flow domain has been divided into various nodes and the velocities are obtained at different nodes for various time intervals. The stability condition for the convergence of solution has been determined and further the convergence of solution has been obtained using a MATLAB program for Couette flow using Crank-Nicolson scheme.

Upon decreasing the Reynolds number, plane Couette flow first forms alternately turbulent and laminar oblique bands out of featureless turbulence below some upper threshold Ret. These bands exist down to a global stability threshold Reg below which laminar flow ultimately prevails. We study the fragmentation and decay of these bands in systems that are extended enough for several bands to exist. We use direct numerical simulations appropriately tailored to deal with such large systems during long enough durations. We point out a two-stage process involving the rupture of a band and then its slow shrinking. Previous interpretations of turbulence decay in wall-bounded flows within the chaotic transient or spatiotemporal intermittency paradigms are discussed.

This article is concerned with the time evolution of the oblique laminar-turbulent bands of transitional plane Couette flow under the influence of turbulent noise. Our study is focused on the amplitude of modulation of turbulence (the bands). In order to guide the numerical study of the flow, we first perform an analytical and numerical analysis of a Stochastic Ginzburg-Landau (GL) equation for a complex order parameter. The modulus of this order parameter models the amplitude of modulation of turbulence. Firstly, we compute the autocorrelation function of said modulus once the band is established. Secondly, we perform a calculation of average and fluctuations around the exponential growth of the order parameter. This type of analysis is similar to the Stochastic Structural Stability Theory (S3T). We then perform numerical simulations of the Navier-Stokes equations in order to confront these predictions with the actual behaviour of the bands. Computation of the autocorrelation function of the modulation of turbulence shows quantitative agreement with the model: in the established band regime, the amplitude of modulation follows an Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process. In order to test the S3T predictions, we perform quench experiments, sudden decreases of the Reynolds number from uniform turbulence, in which modulation appears. We compute the average evolution of the amplitude of modulation and the fluctuations around it. We find good agreement between numerics and modeling. The average trajectory grows exponentially, at a rate clearly smaller than that of the formation of laminar holes. Meanwhile, the actual time evolution remains in a flaring envelope, centered on the average, and expanding at the same rate. These results provide further validation of the stochastic modeling for the time evolution of the bands for further studies. Besides, they stress on the difference between the oblique band formation and the formation of laminar holes.

The problem of flow development from an initially flat velocity profile in the plane Poiseuille and Couette flow geometry is investigated for a viscous fluid. The basic governing momentum and continuity equations are expressed in finite difference form and solved numerically on a high speed digital computer for a mesh network superimposed on the flow field. Results are obtained for the variations of velocity, pressure and resistance coefficient throughout the development region. A characteristic development length is defined and evaluated for both types of flow.

A large conceptual gap separates the theory of low-dimensional chaotic dynamics from the infinite-dimensional nonlinear dynamics of turbulence. Recent advances in experimental imaging, computational methods, and dynamical systems theory suggest a way to bridge this gap in our understanding of turbulence. Recent discoveries show that recurrent coherent structures observed in wall-bounded shear flows (such as pipes and plane Couette flow) result from close passes to weakly unstable invariant solutions of the Navier-Stokes equations. These 3D, fully nonlinear solutions (equilibria, traveling waves, and periodic orbits) structure the state space of turbulent flows and provide a skeleton for analyzing their dynamics. We calculate a hierarchy of invariant solutions for plane Couette, a canonical wall-bounded shear flow. These solutions reveal organization in the flow's turbulent dynamics and can be used to predict directly from the fundamental equations physical quantities such as bulk flow rate and mean wall drag. All results and the code that generates them are disseminated through through our group's open-source CFD software and solution database Channelflow.org and the collaborative e-book ChaosBook.org.KeywordsPeriodic OrbitCoherent StructureProper Orthogonal DecompositionUnstable ManifoldInvariant SolutionThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.

Two new families of exact coherent states are found in plane Poiseuille flow. They are obtained from the stationary and the travelling-wave mirror-symmetric solutions in plane Couette flow by a homotopy continuation. They are characterized by the mirror symmetry inherited from those continued solutions in plane Couette flow. The first family arises from a saddle-node bifurcation and the second family bifurcates by breaking the top–bottom symmetry of the first family. We find that both families exist below the minimum saddle-node-point Reynolds number known to date (Waleffe, Phys. Fluids, vol. 15, 2003, pp. 1517–1534).