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Manipulating thrust wakes: A parallel with biomimetic propulsion

We present an experiment to investigate the role of shed vortices in thrust production. Using two different mechanisms, harmonic acoustic forcing and vortex trapping, a dry-air jet was manipulated to give the wake a typical propulsive-like pattern as observed behind swimmers or flyers. Our results s...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Europhysics letters 2012-02, Vol.97 (4), p.44008
Main Authors: Raspa, V., Gaubert, C., Thiria, B.
Format: Article
Language:English
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Summary:We present an experiment to investigate the role of shed vortices in thrust production. Using two different mechanisms, harmonic acoustic forcing and vortex trapping, a dry-air jet was manipulated to give the wake a typical propulsive-like pattern as observed behind swimmers or flyers. Our results show that even in a thrust production configuration, wakes with asymmetric roll-up of vortices are always associated to performance loss. By contrast, cases involving symmetric modes show thrust enhancement, as reported in very recent studies on pulsed jet propulsion.
ISSN:0295-5075
1286-4854
DOI:10.1209/0295-5075/97/44008