Transitional and weakly turbulent flow in a rotating magnetic field

The early stage of turbulent flow driven by a rotating magnetic field is studied via direct numerical simulations and electric potential measurements for the case of a cylindrical geometry. The numerical results show that the undisturbed flow remains stable up to the linear stability limit ( T a c )...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Physics of fluids (1994) 2006-07, Vol.18 (7), p.074105-074105-10
Main Authors: Stiller, J., Fraňa, K., Cramer, A.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Exact sciences and technology
Fluid dynamics
Fundamental areas of phenomenology (including applications)
Magnetohydrodynamics and electrohydrodynamics
Physics
Transition to turbulence
Turbulent flows, convection, and heat transfer
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Summary:The early stage of turbulent flow driven by a rotating magnetic field is studied via direct numerical simulations and electric potential measurements for the case of a cylindrical geometry. The numerical results show that the undisturbed flow remains stable up to the linear stability limit ( T a c ) , whereas small perturbations may initiate a nonlinear transition at subcritical Taylor numbers. The observed instabilities occur randomly as isolated pairs of Taylor-Görtler vortices, which grow from spots to long tubes until they are dissipated in the lid boundary layers. At 7.5 T a c , the flow is governed by large-scale three-dimensional fluctuations and may be characterized as weakly turbulent. Taylor-Görtler vortices provide the major turbulence mechanism, apart from oscillations of the rotation axis. As the vortices tend to align with the azimuthal direction, they result in a locally two-dimensional turbulence pattern.
ISSN:1070-6631
1089-7666
DOI:10.1063/1.2221347