We study both experimentally and numerically the steady zonal flow generated by longitudinal librations of a spherical rotating container. This study follows the recent weakly nonlinear analysis of Busse (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 650, 2010, pp. 505–512), developed in the limit of small libration frequency–rotation rate ratio and large libration frequency–spin-up time product. Using particle image velocimetry measurements as well as results from axisymmetric numerical simulations, we confirm quantitatively the main features of Busse's analytical solution: the zonal flow takes the form of a retrograde solid-body rotation in the fluid interior, which does not depend on the libration frequency nor on the Ekman number, and which varies as the square of the amplitude of excitation. We also report the presence of an unpredicted prograde flow at the equator near the outer wall.

Internal solitary waves in a system of two fluids, silicone oil and water, bounded above by a free surface are studied both experimentally and theoretically. By adjusting an extra volume of silicone oil released from a reservoir, a wide range of amplitude waves are generated in a wave tank. Wave profiles as well as wave speeds are measured using multiple wave probes and are then compared with both the weakly nonlinear Korteweg–de Vries (KdV) models and the strongly nonlinear Miyata–Choi–Camassa (MCC) models. As the density difference between the two fluids in the experiment is relatively small (approximately 14 %), but non-negligible, special attention is paid to the effect of the boundary condition at the top surface. The nonlinear models valid for rigid-lid (RL) and free-surface (FS) boundary conditions are considered separately. It is found that the solitary wave of the FS model for a given amplitude is consistently narrower than that of the RL model and it propagates at a slightly lower speed. Due to strong nonlinearity in the internal-wave motion, the weakly nonlinear KdV models fail to describe the measured internal solitary wave profiles of intermediate and large wave amplitudes. The strongly nonlinear MCC-FS model agrees better with the measurements than the MCC-RL model, which indicates that the free-surface boundary condition at the top surface is crucial in describing the internal solitary waves in the experiment correctly. Leaving the top surface free in the experiment allows us to observe small and relatively short wave packets on the top surface, particularly when the amplitude of the internal solitary wave is large. Once excited, the wave packet is located above the front half of the internal solitary wave and propagates with a speed close to that of the internal solitary wave underneath. A simple resonance mechanism between short surface waves and long internal waves without and with nonlinear effects is examined to estimate the characteristic wavelength of modulated short surface waves, which is found to be in good agreement with the observed wavelength when nonlinearity is taken into account. Using ray theory, the evolution of short surface waves in the presence of a background current induced by an internal solitary wave is also investigated to examine the location of the modulated surface wave packet.

Linear stability analysis of flow in a channel bounded by wavy walls is considered. It is shown that wall waviness gives rise to an instability that manifests itself through generation of streamwise vortices. The available results suggest that the critical stability criteria based on the Reynolds number based on the amplitude of the waviness can be formulated.

Some h-p finite element computations have been carried out to obtain solutions for fully developed laminar flows in curved pipes with curvature ratios from 0.001 to 0.5. An Oldroyd-3-constant model is used to represent the viscoelastic fluid, which includes the upper-convected Maxwell (UCM) model and the Oldroyd-B model as special cases. With this model we can examine separately the effects of the fluid inertia, and the first and second normal-stress differences. From analysis of the global torque and force balances, three criteria are proposed for this problem to estimate the errors in the computations. Moreover, the finite element solutions are accurately confirmed by the perturbation solutions of Robertson & Muller (1996) in the cases of small Reynolds/Deborah numbers.

Our numerical solutions and an order-of-magnitude analysis of the governing equations elucidate the mechanism of the secondary flow in the absence of second normal-stress difference. For Newtonian flow, the pressure gradient near the wall region is the driving force for the secondary flow; for creeping viscoelastic flow, the combination of large axial normal stress with streamline curvature, the so-called hoop stress near the wall, promotes a secondary flow in the same direction as the inertial secondary flow, despite the adverse pressure gradient there; in the case of inertial viscoelastic flow, both the larger axial normal stress and the smaller inertia near the wall promote the secondary flow.

For both Newtonian and viscoelastic fluids the secondary volumetric fluxes per unit of work consumption and per unit of axial volumetric flux first increase then decrease as the Reynolds/Deborah number increases; this behaviour should be of interest in engineering applications.

Typical negative values of second normal-stress difference can drastically suppress the secondary flow and in the case of small curvature ratios, make the flow approximate the corresponding Poiseuille flow in a straight pipe. The viscoelasticity of Oldroyd-B fluid causes drag enhancement compared to Newtonian flow. Adding a typical negative second normal-stress difference produces large drag reductions for a small curvature ratio δ = 0.01; however, for a large curvature ratio δ = 0.2, although the secondary flows are also drastically attenuated by the second normal-stress difference, the flow resistance remains considerably higher than in Newtonian flow.

It was observed that for the UCM and Oldroyd-B models, the limiting Deborah numbers met in our steady solution calculations obey the same scaling criterion as proposed by McKinley et al. (1996) for elastic instabilities; we present an intriguing problem on the relation between the Newton iteration for steady solutions and the linear stability analyses.

The swimming behaviour of micro-organisms can be strongly influenced by the rheology of their fluid environment. In this article, we experimentally investigate the effects of shear-thinning (ST) viscosity on the swimming behaviour of an undulatory swimmer, the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. Tracking methods are used to measure the swimmer’s kinematic data (including propulsion speed) and velocity fields. We find that ST viscosity modifies the velocity fields produced by the swimming nematode but does not modify the nematode’s speed and beating kinematics. Velocimetry data show significant enhancement in local vorticity and circulation and an increase in fluid velocity near the nematode’s tail. These findings are compared with recent theoretical and numerical results.

When an acoustic wave travels in a lossy medium such as a liquid, it progressively transfers its pseudo-momentum to the fluid, which results in a steady flow called acoustic streaming. This phenomenon involves a balance between sound attenuation and shear, such that the streaming flow does not vanish in the limit of vanishing viscosity. Hence, the effect of viscosity has long been ignored in acoustic streaming experiments. Here, we investigate the acoustic streaming in sessile droplets exposed to surface acoustic waves. According to experimental data, the flow structure and velocity magnitude are both strongly influenced by the fluid viscosity. We compute the sound wave propagation and hydrodynamic flow motion using a numerical method that reduces memory requirements via a spatial filtering of the acoustic streaming momentum source terms. These calculations agree qualitatively well with experiments and reveal how the acoustic field in the droplet, which is dominated by a few caustics, controls the flow pattern. We evidence that chaotic acoustic fields in droplets are dominated by a few caustics. It appears that the caustics drive the flow, which allows for qualitative prediction of the flow structure. Finally, we apply our numerical method to a broader span of fluids and frequencies. We show that the canonical case of the acoustic streaming in a hemispherical sessile droplet resting on a lithium niobate substrate only depends on two dimensionless numbers related to the surface and bulk wave attenuation. Even in such a baseline configuration, we observe and characterize four distinct flow regimes.

Crow & Champagne (1971), Bechert & Pfizenmaier (1975) and Moore (1977) have observed that the growth, mixing and noise production of jet flows are sensitive to harmonic forcing. This paper describes an attempt to model numerically certain features of these flows. The model flow is restricted to be axisymmetric and is consequently unrepresentative of the detailed structure in a real jet. Nonetheless, it is found that reasonable qualitative agreement exists between the results of the model and experiments as far as the large eddies are concerned. This suggests that a substantial part of the large-scale structure in a jet is essentially axisymmetric. Harmonic excitation is also applied to the model jet and the changes in frequency and amplitude of the excitation cause distinct changes in the wavelengths of the jet eddies. This resulting large-eddy behaviour is consistent with many features of the nonlinear behaviour observed experimentally in forced jets.

A self-consistent formalism to estimate baroclinic energy densities and fluxes resulting from the propagation of internal waves of arbitrary amplitude is derived using the concept of available potential energy. The method can be applied to numerical, laboratory or field data. The total energy flux is shown to be the sum of the linear energy flux $\int u'p'\,{\rm d}z$ (primes denote baroclinic quantities), plus contributions from the non-hydrostatic pressure anomaly and the self-advection of kinetic and available potential energy. Using highly resolved observations in Massachusetts Bay, it is shown that due to the presence of nonlinear internal waves periodically propagating in the area, $\int u'p'\,{\rm d}z$ accounts for only half of the total flux. The same data show that equipartition of available potential and kinetic energy can be violated, especially when the nonlinear waves begin to interact with the bottom.

Time-resolved tomographic particle image velocimetry experiments show that new hairpin vortices are generated within a fully developed and unperturbed turbulent boundary layer. The measurements are taken at a Reynolds number based on the momentum thickness of 2038, and cover the near-wall region below $y^{+}=140$, where $y^{+}$ is the wall-normal distance in wall units. Instantaneous visualizations of the flow reveal near-wall low-speed streaks with associated quasi-streamwise vortices, retrograde inverted arch vortices, hairpin vortices and hairpin packets. The hairpin heads are observed as close to the wall as $y^{+}=30$. Examples of hairpin packet evolution reveal the development of new hairpin vortices, which are created upstream and close to the wall in a manner consistent with the auto-generation model (Zhou et al., J. Fluid Mech., vol. 387, 1999, pp. 353–396). The development of the new hairpin appears to be initiated by an approaching sweep event, which perturbs the shear layer associated with the initial packet. The shear layer rolls up, thereby forming the new hairpin head. The head subsequently connects to existing streamwise vortices and develops into a hairpin. The time scale associated with the hairpin auto-generation is 20–30 wall units of time. This demonstrates that hairpins can be created over short distances within a developed turbulent boundary layer, implying that they are not simply remnants of the laminar-to-turbulent transition process far upstream.

Flexible structures placed within an oncoming flow exhibit far more complex vortex-induced dynamics than flexibly mounted rigid cylinders, because they involve the distributed interaction between the structural and wake dynamics along the entire span. Hence, mapping the well-understood properties of rigid cylinder vibrations to those of strings and beams has been elusive. We show here with a combination of experiments, conducted at Reynolds number, $Re$ from 250 to 2300, and computational fluid dynamics that such a mapping is possible for flexible structures in uniform flow undergoing combined cross-flow and in-line oscillations, but only when additional concepts are introduced to model the extended coupling of the flow and the structure. The in-line response consists of largely standing waves that define cells, each cell spanning the distance between adjacent nodes, over which stable vortical patterns form, whose features (‘2S’ versus ‘P$+$S’) depend strongly on the true reduced velocity, $V_{r}=U/f_{y}d$, where $U$ is the inflow velocity, $f_{y}$ is the cross-flow vibration frequency and $d$ is the cylinder diameter, and the phase angle between in-line and cross-flow response; while the cross-flow response may contain travelling waves, breaking the symmetry of the problem. The axial distribution of the highly variable effective added masses in the cross-flow and in-line directions, and the local phase angle between in-line and cross-flow motion determine the single frequency of cross-flow response, while the in-line response vibrates at twice the cross-flow frequency. The cross-flow and in-line lift coefficients in phase with velocity depend strongly on the true reduced velocity but also on the local phase angle between in-line and cross-flow motions. Modal shapes can be defined for in-line and cross-flow, based on the resemblance of the response to conventional modes, which can be in the ratio of either ‘$2n/n$’ or ‘$(2n-1)/n$’, where $n$ is the order of the cross-flow response mode. We use an underwater optical tracking system to reconstruct the sectional fluid forces in a flexible structure and show that, once the cross-flow and in-line motion features are known, employing strip theory and the hydrodynamic coefficients obtained from forced rigid cylinder experiments allows us to predict the distributed forces accurately.

The formation and evolution of flow structures of a finite-span synthetic jet issuing into a quiescent flow were investigated experimentally using stereoscopic particle image velocimetry (SPIV). The effect of two geometrical parameters, the orifice aspect ratio and the neck length, were explored at a Strouhal number of 0.115 and a Reynolds number of 615. Normalized orifice neck lengths of 2, 4 and 6 and aspect ratios of 6, 12, and 18 were examined. It was found that the effect of the aspect ratio is much larger than the effect of the neck length, and as the aspect ratio increases the size of the edge vortices decreases and the presence of secondary structures is more evident. Moreover, axis switching was observed and its streamwise location increases as the aspect ratio increases. The effect of the neck length on the flow structures and the evolution of the synthetic jet was found to be secondary, where the effect was only in the very near field (i.e. close to the jet’s orifice).

We investigate the statistical properties of Rayleigh–Taylor turbulence in a three-dimensional convective cell of high aspect ratio, in which one transverse side is much smaller that the others. By means of high-resolution numerical simulation we study the development of the turbulent mixing layer and the scaling properties of the velocity and temperature fields. We show that the system undergoes a transition from a three- to two-dimensional turbulent regime when the width of the turbulent mixing layer becomes larger than the scale of confinement. In the late stage of the evolution the convective flow is characterized by the coexistence of Kolmogorov–Obukhov and Bolgiano–Obukhov scaling at small and large scales, respectively. These regimes are separated by the Bolgiano scale, which is determined by the scale of confinement of the flow. Our results show that the emergence of the Bolgiano–Obukhov scaling in Rayleigh–Taylor turbulence is connected to the onset of an upscale energy transfer induced by the geometrical constraint of the flow.

Kolmogorov flow in two dimensions – the two-dimensional (2D) Navier–Stokes equations with a sinusoidal body force – is considered over extended periodic domains to reveal localised spatiotemporal complexity. The flow response mimics the forcing at small forcing amplitudes but beyond a critical value develops a long wavelength instability. The ensuing state is described by a Cahn–Hilliard-type equation and as a result coarsening dynamics is observed for random initial data. After further bifurcations, this regime gives way to multiple attractors, some of which possess spatially localised time dependence. Co-existence of such attractors in a large domain gives rise to interesting collisional dynamics which is captured by a system of 5 (1-space and 1-time) partial differential equations (PDEs) based on a long wavelength limit. The coarsening regime reinstates itself at yet higher forcing amplitudes in the sense that only longest-wavelength solutions remain attractors. Eventually, there is one global longest-wavelength attractor which possesses two localised chaotic regions – a kink and antikink – which connect two steady one-dimensional (1D) flow regions of essentially half the domain width each. The wealth of spatiotemporal complexity uncovered presents a bountiful arena in which to study the existence of simple invariant localised solutions which presumably underpin all of the observed behaviour.

Numerical solutions of the Navier–Stokes equations for fully developed, sinusoidal and pulsatile flows in curved tubes are presented for conditions not accessible to analytical perturbation methods. Simulations of physiological pulsatile flows in the aortic arch reveal a wide variety of interesting flow phenomena, including: (1) complex secondary flows with up to seven vortices in the half-tube; (2) cascaded vortex structures with vortices embedded within vortices; (3) strong secondary flows with associated wall shear stress nearly as large as the axial component; (4) reversal of axial-flow direction at the inside wall; (5) peak axial wall shear stress at the inside wall; (6) highest r.m.s. wall shear stress at the inside wall; and (7) oscillatory impedance, which is accurately described by straight-tube theory.

The effects of molecular diffusivities of heat and mass on the counter-gradient scalar and momentum transfer in strongly stable stratification are experimentally investigated in unsheared and sheared stratified water mixing-layer flows downstream of turbulence-generating grids. Experiments are carried out in two kinds of stably stratified water flows. In the case of thermal stratification, the difference between the turbulent fluxes of an active scalar (heat with the Prandtl number of Pr ≈ 6) and a passive scalar (mass with the Schmidt number of Sc ≈ 600) is investigated. In the case of salt stratification, the effects of the molecular diffusion of the active scalar (salt) with a very high Schmidt number of Sc ≈ 600 on the counter-gradient scalar transfer is studied. Comparisons of the effects of molecular diffusivities are also made between thermally stratified water and air (Pr ≈ 0.7) flows. Further, the effects of mean shear on the counter-gradient scalar and momentum transfer are investigated for both stratified cases. Instantaneous temperature, concentration and streamwise and vertical velocities are simultaneously measured using a combined technique with a resistance thermometer, a laser-induced fluorescence method, and a laser-Doppler velocimeter with high spatial resolution. Turbulent scalar fluxes, joint probability density functions, and cospectra are estimated.

The results of the first case show that both active heat and passive mass develop counter-gradient fluxes but that the counter-gradient flux of passive mass is about 10% larger than that of active heat, mostly due to molecular diffusion effects at small scales. The counter-gradient scalar transfer mechanism in stable stratification can be explained by considering the relative balance between the available potential energy and the turbulent kinetic energy as in Schumann (1987). In thermally and salt-stratified water mixing-layer flows with the active scalars of high Prandtl and Schmidt numbers, the buoyancy-induced motions with finger-like structures first contribute to the counter-gradient scalar fluxes at small scales, and then the large-scale motions, which bring fluid back to its original levels, generate the counter-gradient fluxes at large scales. The contribution of the small-scale motions to the counter-gradient fluxes in stratified water flows is quite different from that in stratified air flows. The higher Prandtl or Schmidt number of the active scalar generates both the stronger buoyancy effects and the longer time-oscillation period of the counter-gradient scalar fluxes. The time-oscillation occurs at large scales but the counter-gradient fluxes at small scales persist without oscillating. The mean shear acts to reduce the counter-gradient scalar and momentum transfer at large scales, and therefore the counter-gradient fluxes in sheared stratified flows can be seen only in very strong stratification. The behaviour of the counter-gradient momentum flux in strong stratification is quite similar to that of the counter-gradient scalar flux.

An analysis is given of the initial development of the lift on an aerofoil in inviscid starting flow. It is shown that because of the spiral shape of the vortex sheet shed initially from the trailing edge the lift and drag are both singular at the start of impulsive motion. This result is in contrast with the prediction of finite forces by methods that assume the vortex sheet to be initially planar. The effect of a steady rate of change of incidence following the sudden onset of transverse (heaving) motion of an aerofoil in a steady stream is also discussed.

Measurements are presented for different flow rates of the time-averaged wall shear stress and of the root-mean-square value of the turbulent fluctuations along a small-amplitude sinusoidally shaped solid surface. The stresses are found to have a variation along the wave surface which is also sinusoidal. The influence of flow rate and of wavelength on the amplitude and phase angle can be correlated by using a wave-number α+ made dimensionless with wall parameters.

It is found that for α+ > 10−2 a frozen-turbulence assumption can be made whereby the influence of the wave-induced variation of the mixing length can be ignored. For α+ < 10−4 the flow can be described by assuming the Reynolds stresses are given by an equilibrium assumption. The relaxation from this equilibrium condition is characterized by a sharp change in the phase angle for 6 × 10−4 < α+ < 10−3.

This relaxation is associated with physical processes in the viscous wall region which are not yet understood. It is argued that these are principally related to the wave-induced variation of the pressure gradient.

The wave-induced variation of the turbulent fluctuations in the wall shear stress also indicate a relaxation in that the maximum turbulence intensity is located in a region of favourable pressure gradient.

The wave motion created by a small obstacle placed in a viscous liquid curtain which falls steadily between two vertical guide wires is studied experimentally. The disturbances introduced by the obstacle propagate in the curtain to form two distinctive stationary lines of constant phase; one corresponds to the sinuous mode and the other to the varicose mode. The observed wave motion compares very well with that predicted by the theory of Lin (1980). The observed angle between the tangent at any point on the line of constant phase and the vertical are used to infer the dynamic surface tension of a rapidly moving surface. A considerable difference between the dynamic surface tension and the usual static surface tension is found for a liquid solution. However, no measurable difference is found for a pure liquid at the flow rates used in our experiments.

A theoretical investigation is made of the onset of buoyancy-driven convection in a circular cylinder. Amplitude equations are derived for the weakly nonlinear evolution of critical disturbances at moderate values of the radius-to-height ratio. It is shown that the initial form of the convective motion a t Rayleigh numbers slightly above critical is not axisymmetric. Particular attention is paid to the neighbourhoods of points where two disturbances are simultaneously critical according to linear theory; the nonlinear evolution in such neighbourhoods is studied in detail.

First a three-dimensional turbulent boundary-layer experiment is described. This has been carried out with the specific aim of providing a test-case for calculation methods. Much attention has been paid to the design of the test set-up. An infinite swept-wing flow has been simulated with good accuracy. The initially two-dimensional boundary layer on the test plate was subjected to an adverse pressure gradient, which led to three-dimensional separation near the trailing edge of the plate. Next, a calculation method for three-dimensional turbulent boundary layers is discussed. This solves the boundary-layer equations numerically by finite differences. The turbulent shear stress is obtained from a generalized version of Bradshaw's two-dimensional turbulent shear stress equation. The results of the calculations are compared with those of the experiment. Agreement is good over a considerable distance; but large discrepancies are apparent near the separation line.