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Pressure gradient effects on the large-scale structure of turbulent boundary layers

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 January 2013

Zambri Harun ,
Jason P. Monty ,
Romain Mathis  and
Ivan Marusic
Zambri Harun
Affiliation:
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Melbourne, Victoria 3010, Australia Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, The National University of Malaysia, 43600 Bangi, Malaysia
Jason P. Monty*
Affiliation:
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Melbourne, Victoria 3010, Australia
Romain Mathis
Affiliation:
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Melbourne, Victoria 3010, Australia Laboratoire de Mécanique de Lille, UMR CNRS 8107, 59655 Villeneuve d’Ascq, France
Ivan Marusic
Affiliation:
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Melbourne, Victoria 3010, Australia
*
†Email address for correspondence: montyjp@unimelb.edu.au
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Abstract

Research into high-Reynolds-number turbulent boundary layers in recent years has brought about a renewed interest in the larger-scale structures. It is now known that these structures emerge more prominently in the outer region not only due to increased Reynolds number (Metzger & Klewicki, Phys. Fluids, vol. 13(3), 2001, pp. 692–701; Hutchins & Marusic, J. Fluid Mech., vol. 579, 2007, pp. 1–28), but also when a boundary layer is exposed to an adverse pressure gradient (Bradshaw, J. Fluid Mech., vol. 29, 1967, pp. 625–645; Lee & Sung, J. Fluid Mech., vol. 639, 2009, pp. 101–131). The latter case has not received as much attention in the literature. As such, this work investigates the modification of the large-scale features of boundary layers subjected to zero, adverse and favourable pressure gradients. It is first shown that the mean velocities, turbulence intensities and turbulence production are significantly different in the outer region across the three cases. Spectral and scale decomposition analyses confirm that the large scales are more energized throughout the entire adverse pressure gradient boundary layer, especially in the outer region. Although more energetic, there is a similar spectral distribution of energy in the wake region, implying the geometrical structure of the outer layer remains universal in all cases. Comparisons are also made of the amplitude modulation of small scales by the large-scale motions for the three pressure gradient cases. The wall-normal location of the zero-crossing of small-scale amplitude modulation is found to increase with increasing pressure gradient, yet this location continues to coincide with the large-scale energetic peak wall-normal location (as has been observed in zero pressure gradient boundary layers). The amplitude modulation effect is found to increase as pressure gradient is increased from favourable to adverse.

JFM classification

Boundary Layers: Boundary Layers Turbulent Flows: Turbulent Flows Turbulent Flows: Turbulent boundary layers

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Type
Papers
Information
Journal of Fluid Mechanics , Volume 715 , 25 January 2013 , pp. 477 - 498
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©2013 Cambridge University Press

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