We present a mathematical model of the unidirectional solidification of a suspension of hard-sphere colloids. Similarity solutions are obtained for the volume fraction and temperature profiles ahead of a planar solidification front. The highly nonlinear functional dependence of the diffusion coefficient on the volume fraction gives rise to a range of behaviours. For small particles, Brownian diffusion dominates and the system behaviour is reminiscent of binary-alloy solidification. Constitutional supercooling occurs at the interface under certain conditions, leading potentially to an instability in the shape of the interface. For larger particles, Brownian diffusion is weak and the particles form a porous layer above the interface. In this case constitutional supercooling reaches a maximum near the surface of the layer, and the porous medium itself is potentially unstable. In stable systems there exists the possibility of secondary nucleation of ice.

Detailed velocity measurements and numerical predictions are presented for the flow through a plane nominally two-dimensional duct with a Symmetric sudden expansion of area ratio 1:2. Both the experiments and the predictions confirm a symmetry-breaking bifurcation of the flow leading to one long and one short Separation zone for channel Reynolds numbers above 125, based on the upstream channel height and the maximum flow velocity upstream. With increasing Reynolds numbers above this value, the short separated region remains approximately constant in length whereas the long region increases in length.

The experimental data were obtained using a one-component laser-Doppler anemometer at many Reynolds number values, with more extensive measurements being performed for the three Reynolds numbers 70, 300 and 610. Predictions were made using a finite volume method and an explicit quadratic Leith type of temporal discretization. In general, good agreement was found between measured and predicted velocity profiles for all Reynolds numbers investigated.

Experimental and theoretical studies of vibration-induced flow and mixing of dry granular materials are described. Tests were performed on rounded polystyrene beads contained in a rectangular box having transparent front and back walls and a flexible, nominally horizontal bottom which could be driven at various frequencies and amplitudes. The amplitude of the bottom vibrations was a maximum at the centre and decreased towards the vertical sidewalls. Slow recirculating flows were observed; they had the form of two vortices in which the velocity was upwards at the vertical centreline and downwards along the vertical sidewalls. The streaming velocities were measured as a function of bed vibration frequency and displacement amplitude. An explanation proposed for the recirculating flows is that the vibrating base sends ‘acoustic’ waves upwards through the bed. These waves ‘fluidize’ the granular material but are in turn attenuated because of the dissipative nature of the collisions between the ‘fluidized’ particles. Thus the slow recirculating flows in the granular material are analogous to the more familiar ‘acoustic streaming’ in air. An approximate analysis of these streaming motions is developed by making use of a modification of the constitutive theory of Jenkins & Savage (1983). A number of simplifying assumptions are introduced to make the analysis tractable. The general flow patterns of the streaming motions are predicted, but the velocities are overestimated as a result of the simplifying assumptions. The analysis is restricted to a rather narrow range of conditions.

This paper deals with initial-value problems for the Burgers equation with the inclusion of a hereditary integral known as the fractional derivative of order ½. Emphasis is placed on the difference between the local and global dissipation due to the second-order and the half-order derivatives, respectively. Exploiting the smallness of the coefficient of the second-order derivative, an asymptotic analysis is first developed. When a discontinuity appears, the matched-asymptotic expansion method is employed to derive a uniformly valid solution. If the coefficient of the half-order derivative is also small, as is usually the case, the evolution comprises three stages, namely a lossless near field, an intermediate Burgers region, and a hereditary far field. In view of these results, the equation is then solved numerically, under various initial conditions, by finite-difference and spectral methods. It is revealed that the effect of the fractional derivative accumulates slowly to give rise to a significant dissipation and distortion of the waveform globally, which is to be contrasted with the effect of the second-order derivative, significant only locally, in a thin 'shock layer’.

The Cahn–Hilliard model is increasingly often being used in combination with the incompressible Navier–Stokes equation to describe unsteady binary fluids in a variety of applications ranging from turbulent two-phase flows to microfluidics. The thickness of the interface between the two bulk fluids and the mobility are the main parameters of the model. For real fluids they are usually too small to be directly used in numerical simulations. Several authors proposed criteria for the proper choice of interface thickness and mobility in order to reach the so-called ‘sharp-interface limit’. In this paper the problem is approached by a formal asymptotic expansion of the governing equations. It is shown that the mobility is an effective parameter to be chosen proportional to the square of the interface thickness. The theoretical results are confirmed by numerical simulations for two prototypal flows, namely capillary waves riding the interface and droplets coalescence. The numerical analysis of two different physical problems confirms the theoretical findings and establishes an optimal relationship between the effective parameters of the model.

This investigation is concerned with the phenomenon of a gas jet impinging on and penetrating into a liquid. The study has been restricted to the cases of circular and plane jets penetrating a liquid at right angles. Both ‘free streamline’ and turbulent jets were considered. The phenomenon was analysed from two viewpoints. The first, a stagnation-pressure analysis, related the depth of the surface depression or cavity to the stagnation pressure based on the centre-line velocity of the jet in the neighbourhood of the surface. The second, a displaced-liquid analysis, related the weight of the liquid displaced from the cavity to the momentum of the jet.

Numerous experiments were conducted in which the cavity depth, diameter or width, and peripheral lip height were measured. The role of surface tension in affecting the cavity depth was considered and the phenomenon of drop formation was examined. Some attention was given to the case of a plane jet impinging on a moving liquid. It was found that the experimental data fit into the framework of these analyses quite consistently.

The wake of a five-bladed marine propeller at design operating condition is studied using large eddy simulation (LES). The mean loads and phase-averaged flow field show good agreement with experiments. Phase-averaged and azimuthal-averaged flow fields are analysed in detail to examine the mechanisms of wake instability. The propeller wake consisting of tip and hub vortices undergoes streamtube contraction, which is followed by the onset of instabilities as evident from the oscillations of the tip vortices. Simulation results reveal a mutual-induction mechanism of instability where, instead of the tip vortices interacting among themselves, they interact with the smaller vortices generated by the roll-up of the blade trailing edge wake in the near wake. It is argued that although the mutual-inductance mode is the dominant mode of instability in propellers, the actual mechanism depends on the propeller geometry and the operating conditions. The axial evolution of the propeller wake from near to far field is discussed. Once the propeller wake becomes unstable, the coherent vortical structures break up and evolve into the far wake, composed of a fluid mass swirling around an oscillating hub vortex. The hub vortex remains coherent over the length of the computational domain.

Negative or rarefaction shock waves may exist in single-phase fluids under certain conditions. It is necessary that a particular fluid thermodynamic quantity Γ ≡ −½δ In (δP/δν)s/δ In ν be negative: this condition appears to be met for sufficiently large specific heat, corresponding to a sufficient level of molecular complexity. The dynamic formation and evolution of a negative shock is treated, as well as its properties. Such shocks satisfy stability conditions and have a positive, though small, entropy jump. The viscous shock structure is found from an approximate continuum model. Possible experimental difficulties in the laboratory production of negative shocks are briefly discussed.

The tip-leakage flow in a turbomachinery cascade is studied using large-eddy simulation with particular emphasis on understanding the underlying mechanisms for viscous losses in the vicinity of the tip gap. Systematic and detailed analysis of the mean flow field and turbulence statistics has been made in a linear cascade with a moving endwall. Gross features of the tip-leakage vortex, tip-separation vortices, and blade wake have been revealed by investigating their revolutionary trajectories and mean velocity fields. The tip-leakage vortex is identified by regions of significant streamwise velocity deficit and high streamwise and pitchwise vorticity magnitudes. The tip-leakage vortex and the tip-leakage jet which is generated by the pressure difference between the pressure and suction sides of the blade tip are found to produce significant mean velocity gradients along the spanwise direction, leading to the production of vorticity and turbulent kinetic energy. The velocity gradients are the major causes for viscous losses in the cascade endwall region. The present analysis suggests that the endwall viscous losses can be alleviated by changing the direction of the tip-leakage flow such that the associated spanwise derivatives of the mean streamwise and pitchwise velocity components are reduced.

Experimental measurements of the three-dimensional (3D) velocity field in a moderate Reynolds number zero pressure-gradient boundary layer are presented. The measurements are analysed to produce 3D correlations and conditional averaging techniques are used to further elucidate the underlying structure. The results show clear evidence of vortex-packet-type structures and shed new light on the detailed 3D structure of such packets in a real zero pressure-gradient boundary layer.

A systems theory framework is presented for the linear stabilization of two-dimensional laminar plane Poiseuille flow. The governing linearized Navier-Stokes equations are converted to control-theoretic models using a numerical discretization scheme. Fluid system poles, which are closely related to Orr-Sommerfeld eigenvalues, and fluid system zeros are computed using the control-theoretic models. It is shown that the location of system zeros, in addition to the well-studied system eigenvalues, are important in linear stability control. The location of system zeros determines the effect of feedback control on both stable and unstable eigenvalues. In addition, system zeros can be used to determine sensor locations that lead to simple feedback control schemes. Feedback controllers are designed that make a new fluid-actuator-sensorcontroller system linearly stable. Feedback control is shown to be robust to a wide range of Reynolds numbers. The systems theory concepts of modal controllability and observability are used to show that feedback control can lead to short periods of highamplitude transients that are unseen at the output. These transients may invalidate the linear model, stimulate nonlinear effects, and/or form a path of ‘bypass’ transition in a controlled system. Numerical simulations are presented to validate the stabilization of both single-wavenumber and multiple-wavenumber instabilities. Finally, it is shown that a controller designed upon linear theory also has a strong stabilizing effect on two-dimensional finite-amplitude disturbances. As a result, secondary instabilities due to infinitesimal three-dimensional disturbances in the presence of a finite-amplitude two-dimensional disturbance cease to exist.

A new theory of coherent structure in wall turbulence is presented. The theory is the first to predict packets of hairpin vortices and other structure in turbulence, and their dynamics, based on an analysis of the Navier–Stokes equations, under an assumption of a turbulent mean profile. The assumption of the turbulent mean acts as a restriction on the class of possible structures. It is shown that the coherent structure is a manifestation of essentially low-dimensional flow dynamics, arising from a critical-layer mechanism. Using the decomposition presented in McKeon & Sharma (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 658, 2010, pp. 336–382), complex coherent structure is recreated from minimal superpositions of response modes predicted by the analysis, which take the form of radially varying travelling waves. The leading modes effectively constitute a low-dimensional description of the turbulent flow, which is optimal in the sense of describing the resonant effects around the critical layer and which minimally predicts all types of structure. The approach is general for the full range of scales. By way of example, simple combinations of these modes are offered that predict hairpins and modulated hairpin packets. The example combinations are chosen to represent observed structure, consistent with the nonlinear triadic interaction for wavenumbers that is required for self-interaction of structures. The combination of the three leading response modes at streamwise wavenumbers $6, ~1, ~7$ and spanwise wavenumbers $\pm 6, ~\pm 6, ~\pm 12$, respectively, with phase velocity $2/ 3$, is understood to represent a turbulence ‘kernel’, which, it is proposed, constitutes a self-exciting process analogous to the near-wall cycle. Together, these interactions explain how the mode combinations may self-organize and self-sustain to produce experimentally observed structure. The phase interaction also leads to insight into skewness and correlation results known in the literature. It is also shown that the very large-scale motions act to organize hairpin-like structures such that they co-locate with areas of low streamwise momentum, by a mechanism of locally altering the shear profile. These energetic streamwise structures arise naturally from the resolvent analysis, rather than by a summation of hairpin packets. In addition, these packets are modulated through a ‘beat’ effect. The relationship between Taylor’s hypothesis and coherence is discussed, and both are shown to be the consequence of the localization of the response modes around the critical layer. A pleasing link is made to the classical laminar inviscid theory, whereby the essential mechanism underlying the hairpin vortex is captured by two obliquely interacting Kelvin–Stuart (cat’s eye) vortices. Evidence for the theory is presented based on comparison with observations of structure in turbulent flow reported in the experimental and numerical simulation literature and with exact solutions reported in the transitional literature.

Direct numerical simulations (DNS) are conducted for turbulent flow through pipes with three-dimensional sinusoidal roughnesses explicitly represented by body-conforming grids. The same viscous-scaled roughness geometry is first simulated at a range of different Reynolds numbers to investigate the effects of low Reynolds numbers and low $R_{0}/h$, where $R_{0}$ is the pipe radius and $h$ is the roughness height. Results for the present class of surfaces show that the Hama roughness function ${\rm\Delta}U^{+}$ is only marginally affected by low Reynolds numbers (or low $R_{0}/h$), and observations of outer-layer similarity (or lack thereof) show no signs of sensitivity to Reynolds number. Then, building on this, a systematic approach is taken to isolate the effects of roughness height $h^{+}$ and wavelength ${\it\lambda}^{+}$ in a turbulent wall-bounded flow in both transitionally rough and fully rough regimes. Current findings show that while the effective slope $\mathit{ES}$ (which for the present sinusoidal surfaces is proportional to $h^{+}/{\it\lambda}^{+}$) is an important roughness parameter, the roughness function ${\rm\Delta}U^{+}$ must also depend on some measure of the viscous roughness height. A simplistic linear–log fit clearly illustrates the strong correlation between ${\rm\Delta}U^{+}$ and both the roughness average height $k_{a}^{+}$ (which is related to $h^{+}$) and $\mathit{ES}$ for the surfaces simulated here, consistent with published literature. Various definitions of the virtual origin for rough-wall turbulent pipe flow are investigated and, for the surfaces simulated here, the hydraulic radius of the pipe appears to be the most suitable parameter, and indeed is the only virtual origin that can ever lead to collapse in the total stress. First- and second-order statistics are also analysed and collapses in the outer layer are observed for all cases, including those where the largest roughness height is a substantial proportion of the reference radius (low $R_{0}/h$). These results provide evidence that turbulent pipe flow over the present sinusoidal surfaces adheres to Townsend’s notion of outer-layer similarity, which pertains to statistics of relative motion.

We investigate the entrainment, deposition and motion of coarse spherical particles within a turbulent shallow water stream down a steep slope. This is an idealization of bed-load transport in mountain streams. Earlier investigations have described this kind of sediment transport using empirical correlations or concepts borrowed from continuum mechanics. The intermittent character of particle transport at low-water discharges led us to consider it as a random process. Sediment transport in this regime results from the imbalance between entrainment and deposition of particles rather than from momentum balance between water and particles. We develop a birth–death immigration–emigration Markov process to describe the particle exchanges between the bed and the water stream. A key feature of the model is its long autocorrelation times and wide, frequent fluctuations in the solid discharge, a phenomenon never previously explained despite its ubiquity in both nature and laboratory experiments. We present experimental data obtained using a nearly two-dimensional channel and glass beads as a substitute for sediment. Entrainment, trajectories, and deposition were monitored using a high-speed digital camera. The empirical probability distributions of the solid discharge and deposition frequency were properly described by the theoretical model. Experiments confirmed the existence of wide and frequent fluctuations of the solid discharge, and revealed the existence of long autocorrelation time, but theory overestimates the autocorrelation times by a factor of around three. Particle velocity was weakly dependent on the fluid velocity contrary to the predictions of the theoretical model, which performs well when a single particle is moving. For our experiments, the dependence of the solid discharge on the fluid velocity is entirely controlled by the number of moving particles rather than by their velocity. We also noted significant changes in the behaviour of particle transport when the bed slope or the water discharge was increased. The more vigorous the stream was, the more continuous the solid discharge became. Moreover, although 90% of the energy supplied by gravity to the stream is dissipated by turbulence for slopes lower than 10%, particles dissipate more and more energy when the bed slope is increased, but surprisingly, the dissipation rate is nearly independent of fluid velocity. A movie is available with the online version of the paper.

The hydrodynamic force acting on a rigid spherical particle translating with arbitrary time-dependent motion in a time-dependent flowing fluid is calculated to O(Re) for small but finite values of the Reynolds number, Re, based on the particle's slip velocity relative to the uniform flow. The corresponding expression for an arbitrarily shaped rigid particle is evaluated for the case when the timescale of variation of the particle's slip velocity is much greater than the diffusive scale, a2/v, where a is the characteristic particle dimension and v is the kinematic viscosity of the fluid. It is found that the expression for the hydrodynamic force is not simply an additive combination of the results from unsteady Stokes flow and steady Oseen flow and that the temporal decay to steady state for small but finite Re is always faster than the t-½ behaviour of unsteady Stokes flow. For example, when the particle accelerates from rest the temporal approach to steady state scales as t-2.

Calculated values of the three velocity components and measured values of the longitudinal component are reported for the flow of water in a 90° bend of 40 x 40mm cross-section; the bend had a mean radius of 92mm and was located downstream of a 1[sdot ]8m and upstream of a 1[sdot ]2m straight section. The experiments were carried out at a Reynolds number, based on the hydraulic diameter and bulk velocity, of 790 (corresponding to a Dean number of 368). Flow visualization was used to identify qualitatively the characteristics of the flow and laser-Doppler anemometry to quantify the velocity field. The results confirm and quantify that the location of maximum velocity moves from the centre of the duct towards the outer wall and, in the 90° plane, is located around 85% of the duct width from the inner wall. Secondary velocities up to 65% of the bulk longitudinal velocity were calculated and small regions of recirculation, close to the outer corners of the duct and in the upstream region, were also observed.

The calculated results were obtained by solving the Navier–Stokes equations in cylindrical co-ordinates. They are shown to exhibit the same trends as the experiments and to be in reasonable quantitative agreement even though the number of node points used to discretize the flow for the finite-difference solution of the differential equations was limited by available computer time and storage. The region of recirculation observed experimentally is confirmed by the calculations. The magnitude of the various terms in the equations is examined to determine the extent to which the details of the flow can be represented by reduced forms of the Navier–Stokes equations. The implications of the use of so-called ‘partially parabolic’ equations and of potential- and rotational-flow analysis of an ideal fluid are quantified.

Measurements of the Reynolds stresses, integral lengthscales and Taylor microscales are reported for several cases of uniformly sheared turbulent flows with shear values in a range substantially wider than those of previous measurements. It is shown that such flows demonstrate a self-preserving structure, in which the dimensionless Reynolds stress ratios and the dissipation over production ratio, ε/P, remain essentially constant. Flows with sufficiently large $k_{\rm s} = (1/\overline{U_{\rm c}}){\rm d}\overline{U_1}dx_2$ have exponentially growing stresses and ε/P ≈ 0.68; a linear relationship between the coefficient in the exponentiallaw and ks is shown to be compatible with measurements having ks > 3. The possibility of a self-preserving structure with asymptotically constant stresses and ε/P ≈ 1.0 is also compatible with measurements, corresponding to flows with small values of ks. The integral lengthscales appear to grow according to a power law with an exponent of about 0.8, independent of the mean shear, while the Taylor microscales, in general, approach constant values. Various attempts to scale the stresses and to predict their evolution are discussed and the applicability of Hasen's theory is scrutinized. Finally, an ‘exact’ expression for the pressure-strain rate covariance is derived and compared to some popular models.

Turbulent flow in a rectangular channel is investigated to determine the scale and pattern of the eddies that contribute most to the total turbulent kinetic energy and the Reynolds shear stress. Instantaneous, two-dimensional particle image velocimeter measurements in the streamwise-wall-normal plane at Reynolds numbers Reh = 5378 and 29 935 are used to form two-point spatial correlation functions, from which the proper orthogonal modes are determined. Large-scale motions – having length scales of the order of the channel width and represented by a small set of low-order eigenmodes – contain a large fraction of the kinetic energy of the streamwise velocity component and a small fraction of the kinetic energy of the wall-normal velocities. Surprisingly, the set of large-scale modes that contains half of the total turbulent kinetic energy in the channel, also contains two-thirds to three-quarters of the total Reynolds shear stress in the outer region. Thus, it is the large-scale motions, rather than the main turbulent motions, that dominate turbulent transport in all parts of the channel except the buffer layer. Samples of the large-scale structures associated with the dominant eigenfunctions are found by projecting individual realizations onto the dominant modes. In the streamwise wall-normal plane their patterns often consist of an inclined region of second quadrant vectors separated from an upstream region of fourth quadrant vectors by a stagnation point/shear layer. The inclined Q4/shear layer/Q2 region of the largest motions extends beyond the centreline of the channel and lies under a region of fluid that rotates about the spanwise direction. This pattern is very similar to the signature of a hairpin vortex. Reynolds number similarity of the large structures is demonstrated, approximately, by comparing the two-dimensional correlation coefficients and the eigenvalues of the different modes at the two Reynolds numbers.

The propagation of plane acoustic waves in smooth pipes and their reflection at open pipe terminations have been studied experimentally. The accuracy of the measurements is determined by comparison of experimental data with results of linear theory for the propagation of acoustic waves in a pipe with a quiescent fluid. The damping and the reflection at an unflanged pipe termination are compared.

In the presence of a fully developed turbulent mean flow the measurements of the damping confirm the results of Ronneberger & Ahrens (1977). In the high-frequency limit the quasi-laminar theory of Ronneberger (1975) predicts accurately the convective effects on the damping of acoustic waves. For low frequencies a simple theory combining the rigid-plate model of Ronneberger & Ahrens (1977) with the theoretical approach of Howe (1984) yields a fair prediction of the influence of turbulence on the shear stress. The finite response time of the turbulence near the wall to the acoustic perturbations has to be taken into account in order to explain the experimental data. The model yields a quasi-stationary limit of the damping which does not take into account the fundamental difference between the viscous and thermal dissipation observed for low frequencies.

Measurements of the nonlinear behaviour of the reflection properties for unflanged pipe terminations with thin and thick walls in the absence of a mean flow confirm the theory of Disselhorst & van Wijngaarden (1980), for the low-frequency limit. It appears however that a two-dimensional theory such as proposed by Disselhorst & van Wijngaarden (1980) for the high-frequency limit underestimates the acoustical energy absorption by vortex shedding by a factor 2.5.

The measured influence of wall thickness on the reflection properties of an open pipe end confirms the linear theory of Ando (1969). In the presence of a mean flow the end correction δ of an unflanged pipe end varies from the value at the high-Strouhal-number limit of δ/a = 0.61, with a the pipe radius, which is close to the value in the absence of a mean flow given by Levine & Schwinger (1948) of δ/a = 0.6133, to a value of δ/a = 0.19 in the low-Strouhal-number limit which is close to the value predicted by Rienstra (1983) of δ/a = 0.26.

The pressure reflection coefficient is found to agree with the theoretical predictions by Munt (1977, 1990) and Cargill (1982b) in which a full Kutta condition is included. The accuracy of the theory is fascinating in view of the dramatic simplifications introduced in the theory. For a thick-walled pipe end and a pipe terminated by a horn the end correction behaviour is similar. It is surprising that the nonlinear behaviour at low frequencies and high acoustic amplitudes in the absence of mean flow does not influence the end correction significantly.

The aero-acoustic behaviour of the pipe end is dramatially influenced by the presence of a horn. In the presence of a mean flow the horn is a source of sound for a critical range of the Strouhal number.

The high accuracy of the experimental data suggests that acoustic measurements can be used for a systematic study of turbulence in unsteady flow and of unsteady flow separation.

The flow in a pipe of circular cross-section which is coiled in a circle is studied, the pressure gradient along the pipe varying sinusoidally in time with frequency . The radius of the pipe a is assumed small in relation to the radius of curvature of its axis R. Of special interest is the secondary flow generated by centrifugal effects in the plane of the cross-section of the pipe, and an asymptotic theory is developed for small values of the parameter = (2/a2), where is the kinematic viscosity of the fluid. The secondary flow is found to be governed by a Reynolds number , where is a typical velocity along the axis of the pipe, and asymptotic theories are developed for both small and large values of this parameter. For sufficiently small values of it is found that the secondary flow in the interior of the pipe is in the opposite sense to that predicted for a steady pressure gradient, and this is verified qualitatively by an experiment described at the end of the paper.