Investigation of the Three-Dimensional Coherent Structures in a Turbulent Boundary Layer with Tomographic-PIV

Author(s):  
Gerrit Elsinga ◽  
Dirk Jan Kuik ◽  
Bas Van Oudheusden ◽  
Fulvio Scarano
2015 ◽  
Vol 778 ◽  
pp. 451-484 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kengo Deguchi ◽  
Philip Hall

In a recent paper, Deguchi & Hall (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 752, 2014a, pp. 602–625) described a new kind of exact coherent structure which sits at the edge of an asymptotic suction boundary layer at high values of the Reynolds number $Re$. At a distance $\ln Re$ from the wall, the structure is driven by the fully nonlinear interaction of tiny rolls, waves and streaks convected downstream at almost the free-stream speed. The interaction problem satisfies the unit-Reynolds-number three-dimensional Navier–Stokes equations and is localized in a layer of the same depth as the unperturbed boundary layer. Here, we show that the interaction problem is generic to any boundary layer that approaches its free-stream form through an exponentially small correction. It is shown that away from the layer where it is generated the induced roll–streak flow is dominated by non-parallel effects which now play a major role in the streamwise evolution of the structure. The similarity with the parallel boundary layer case is restricted only to the layer where it is generated. It is shown that non-parallel effects cause the structure to persist only over intervals of finite length in any growing boundary layer and lead to a flow structure reminiscent of turbulent boundary layer simulations. The results found shed light on a possible mechanism to couple near-wall streaks with coherent structures located towards the edge of a turbulent boundary layer. Some discussion of how the mechanism adapts to a three-dimensional base flow is given.


2018 ◽  
Vol 859 ◽  
pp. 1-32 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammad Elyasi ◽  
Sina Ghaemi

Coherent structures of a three-dimensional (3D) separation due to an adverse pressure gradient are investigated experimentally. The flow set-up consists of a flat plate to develop a turbulent boundary layer upstream of an asymmetric two-dimensional diffuser with one diverging surface. The diffuser surface has an initial mild curvature followed by a flat section where flow separation occurs. The top and the two sidewalls of the diffuser are not equipped with any flow control mechanism to form a 3D separation. Planar particle image velocimetry (PIV) using four side-by-side cameras is applied to characterize the flow with high spatial resolution over a large streamwise-wall-normal field of view (FOV). Tomographic PIV (tomo-PIV) is also applied for volumetric measurement in a domain flush with the flat surface of the diffuser. The mean flow obtained from averaging instantaneous velocity fields of this intermittent unsteady flow appears as a vortex with an elliptical cross-section. The major axis of the ellipse is tilted with respect to the streamwise direction. As a result, the average velocity in the mid-span of the diffuser has an upstream forward flow and a downstream backward flow, separated by a point of zero wall shear stress. Sweep motions mainly carry out transport of turbulent kinetic energy upstream of this point, while ejections dominate at the downstream region. In the instantaneous flow fields, forward and backward flows have equivalent strength, and the separation front is extended in the spanwise direction. The conditional average of the separation instants forms a saddle-point structure with streamlines converging in the spanwise direction. Proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) of the tomo-PIV data demonstrates that about 42 % of the turbulent kinetic energy is present in the first pair of modes, with a strong spanwise component. The spatial modes of POD also show focus, node and saddle-point structures. The average of the coefficients of the dominant POD modes during the separation events is used to develop a reduced-order model (ROM). Based on the ROM, the instantaneous 3D separation over the diffuser is a saddle-point structure interacting with focus-type structures.


2013 ◽  
Vol 718-720 ◽  
pp. 801-806
Author(s):  
Hai Ping Tian ◽  
Shao Qiong Yang ◽  
Nan Jiang

Database of time series of the instantaneous three-dimensional three-component (3D-3C) velocity vector field, measured by tomographic time-resolved PIV(Tomo-PIV) in a water tunnel, was analyzed to investigate spatial topologies of coherent structures in the turbulent boundary layer (TBL). A new concept of spatial locally averaged velocity structure function of turbulence is put forward to describe the spatial dilation or compression of the multi-scale coherent structures in the TBL. According to the physical mechanism of dilation or compression of multi-scale coherent vortex structures in the turbulent flow, a new conditional sampling method was proposed as well to extract the spatial topological characteristics of physical quantities of coherent structures, such as fluctuating velocities, velocity gradients, velocity strain rates and vorticity during the bursting process in the Tomo-PIV database. Furthermore, the anti-symmetric structures are the typical spatial topologies characteristics for the velocity gradients and vorticity during coherent structures burst.


2010 ◽  
Vol 644 ◽  
pp. 35-60 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. E. ELSINGA ◽  
R. J. ADRIAN ◽  
B. W. VAN OUDHEUSDEN ◽  
F. SCARANO

Tomographic particle image velocimetry was used to quantitatively visualize the three-dimensional coherent structures in a supersonic (Mach 2) turbulent boundary layer in the region between y/δ = 0.15 and 0.89. The Reynolds number based on momentum thickness Reθ = 34000. The instantaneous velocity fields give evidence of hairpin vortices aligned in the streamwise direction forming very long zones of low-speed fluid, consistent with Tomkins & Adrian (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 490, 2003, p. 37). The observed hairpin structure is also a statistically relevant structure as is shown by the conditional average flow field associated to spanwise swirling motion. Spatial low-pass filtering of the velocity field reveals streamwise vortices and signatures of large-scale hairpins (height > 0.5δ), which are weaker than the smaller scale hairpins in the unfiltered velocity field. The large-scale hairpin structures in the instantaneous velocity fields are observed to be aligned in the streamwise direction and spanwise organized along diagonal lines. Additionally the autocorrelation function of the wall-normal swirling motion representing the large-scale hairpin structure returns positive correlation peaks in the streamwise direction (at 1.5δ distance from the DC peak) and along the 45° diagonals, which also suggest a periodic arrangement in those directions. This is evidence for the existence of a spanwise–streamwise organization of the coherent structures in a fully turbulent boundary layer.


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