Gravitational–capillary waves, arising in a system of thick layers of two aggregate states of a substance, are studied using the example of water and its vapour. Their initially flat interface is in hydrostatic and thermodynamic equilibrium at atmospheric pressure and the corresponding saturation temperature $100\,^{\circ }\text{C}$, provided that a balance is maintained for heat fluxes transported through immovable phases in the process of heat conduction. From the problem of linear stability for small perturbations, estimation relations for their damping coefficient and eigenfrequency shift are obtained, including the factors of viscosities of the media and phase transition. The first two contributions, proportional to the kinematic viscosity of the liquid and the square root of the kinematic viscosity of its vapour, respectively, are consistent, accurate to additionally accounted for capillary forces, with the result of Dore’s analysis, which is a development of the weakly viscous Lamb theory for ‘deep water’. Numerical calculations have shown that, with increasing wavelength, the accuracy of the proposed approximation increases, especially for the wave damping coefficient, and the contribution of the viscosity of the light phase increases in percentage terms. As for the phase transition effect, which was previously overestimated using the quasi-equilibrium approximation, it remains insignificant at the level of heat fluxes acceptable in the model of thick layers of homogeneous media. The factor of thermocapillarity is found to be very weak; it becomes qualitatively noticeable only on the background of disappearing heating. Here, together with the factor of dependence of the saturation temperature on the phase pressure, it determines a non-zero correction to the wave damping coefficient.

We theoretically investigate the problem of subharmonic resonant interaction of a progressive (axially symmetric) ring wave with a radial cross-wave in the context of the potential-flow formulation for gravity-capillary waves. The objective is to understand the nonlinear mechanism governing energy transfer from a progressive ring wave to its subharmonic cross-waves through triadic resonant interactions. We first show that for an arbitrary three-dimensional body floating in an unbounded free surface, there exists a set of homogeneous solutions at any frequency in the gravity-capillary wave context. The homogeneous solution depends solely on the mean free-surface slope at the waterline of the body and physically represents a progressive radial cross-wave. Unlike standing cross-waves, a progressive cross-wave loses energy during propagation by overcoming the work done by surface tension at the waterline and through wave radiation. We then consider the subharmonic interaction of a progressive ring wave, which is forced by a radial swelling–contraction deformation of a vertical circular cylinder, with subharmonic cross-waves. We derive the nonlinear spatial–temporal evolution equation governing the motion of the cross-wave by use of the average Lagrangian method. In addition to energy-input terms from the interaction with the forced ring wave, the evolution equation contains a damping term associated with energy loss in cross-wave propagation. We show that the presence of the damping term leads to a non-trivial threshold value of the ring wave steepness (or amplitude) beyond which the cross-wave becomes unstable and grows with time by taking energy from the ring wave. Finally, we extend this analysis to the experimental case of Tatsuno et al. (Rep. Res. Inst. Appl. Mech. Kyushu University, vol. 17, 1969, pp. 195–215) in which asymmetric wave patterns are observed during high-frequency vertical oscillations of a surface-piercing sphere. The theoretical prediction of the threshold value of oscillation amplitude and characteristic features of generated radial cross-waves agrees reasonably well with experimental observations.

The effect of permeability heterogeneities and viscosity variations on miscible displacement processes in porous media is examined using high-resolution numerical simulations and reduced theoretical modelling. The planar injection of one fluid into a fluid-saturated, two-dimensional porous medium with a permeability that varies perpendicular to the flow direction is studied. Three cases are considered, in which the injected fluid is equally viscous, more viscous or less viscous than the ambient fluid. In general it is found that the flow in each case evolves through three regimes. At early times, the flow exhibits the concentration evolves diffusively, independent of both the permeability structure and the viscosity ratio. At intermediate times, the flow exhibits different dynamics including channelling and fingering, depending on whether the injected fluid is more or less viscous than the ambient fluid, and depending on the relative magnitude of the viscosity and permeability variations. Finally, at late times, the flow becomes independent of the viscosity ratio and dominated by shear-enhanced (Taylor) dispersion. For each of the regimes identified above, we develop reduced-order models for the evolution of the transversely averaged concentration and compare them to the full numerical simulations.

Direct numerical simulations of two superposed fluids in a channel with a textured surface on the lower wall have been carried out. A parametric study varying the viscosity ratio between the two fluids has been performed to mimic both idealised super-hydrophobic and liquid-infused surfaces and assess its effect on the frictional, form and total drag for three different textured geometries: longitudinal square bars, transversal square bars and staggered cubes. The interface between the two fluids is assumed to be slippery in the streamwise and spanwise directions and not deformable in the vertical direction, corresponding to the ideal case of infinite surface tension. To identify the role of the fluid–fluid interface, an extra set of simulations with a single fluid has been carried out. Comparison with the cases with two fluids reveals the role of the interface in suppressing turbulent transport between the lubricating layer and the overlying flow decreasing the overall drag. In addition, the drag and the maximum wall-normal velocity fluctuations were found to be highly correlated for all the surface configurations, whether they reduce or increase the drag. This implies that the structure of the near-wall turbulence is dominated by the total shear and not by the local boundary condition of the super-hydrophobic, liquid infused or rough surfaces.

We consider the Euler equations for the potential flow of an ideal incompressible fluid of infinite depth with a free surface in two-dimensional geometry. Both gravity and surface tension forces are taken into account. A time-dependent conformal mapping is used which maps the lower complex half-plane of the auxiliary complex variable $w$ into the fluid’s area, with the real line of $w$ mapped into the free fluid’s surface. We reformulate the exact Eulerian dynamics through a non-canonical non-local Hamiltonian structure for a pair of the Hamiltonian variables. These two variables are the imaginary part of the conformal map and the fluid’s velocity potential, both evaluated at the fluid’s free surface. The corresponding Poisson bracket is non-degenerate, i.e. it does not have any Casimir invariant. Any two functionals of the conformal mapping commute with respect to the Poisson bracket. The new Hamiltonian structure is a generalization of the canonical Hamiltonian structure of Zakharov (J. Appl. Mech. Tech. Phys., vol. 9(2), 1968, pp. 190–194) which is valid only for solutions for which the natural surface parametrization is single-valued, i.e. each value of the horizontal coordinate corresponds only to a single point on the free surface. In contrast, the new non-canonical Hamiltonian equations are valid for arbitrary nonlinear solutions (including multiple-valued natural surface parametrization) and are equivalent to the Euler equations. We also consider a generalized hydrodynamics with the additional physical terms in the Hamiltonian beyond the Euler equations. In that case we identify powerful reductions that allow one to find general classes of particular solutions.

Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes (RANS) simulations with turbulence closure models continue to play important roles in industrial flow simulations. However, the commonly used linear eddy-viscosity models are intrinsically unable to handle flows with non-equilibrium turbulence (e.g. flows with massive separation). Reynolds stress models, on the other hand, are plagued by their lack of robustness. Recent studies in plane channel flows found that even substituting Reynolds stresses with errors below 0.5 % from direct numerical simulation databases into RANS equations leads to velocities with large errors (up to 35 %). While such an observation may have only marginal relevance to traditional Reynolds stress models, it is disturbing for the recently emerging data-driven models that treat the Reynolds stress as an explicit source term in the RANS equations, as it suggests that the RANS equations with such models can be ill-conditioned. So far, a rigorous analysis of the condition of such models is still lacking. As such, in this work we propose a metric based on local condition number function for a priori evaluation of the conditioning of the RANS equations. We further show that the ill-conditioning cannot be explained by the global matrix condition number of the discretized RANS equations. Comprehensive numerical tests are performed on turbulent channel flows at various Reynolds numbers and additionally on two complex flows, i.e. flow over periodic hills, and flow in a square duct. Results suggest that the proposed metric can adequately explain observations in previous studies, i.e. deteriorated model conditioning with increasing Reynolds number and better conditioning of the implicit treatment of the Reynolds stress compared to the explicit treatment. This metric can play critical roles in the future development of data-driven turbulence models by enforcing the conditioning as a requirement on these models.

We derive a mathematical model for the drawing of a two-dimensional thin sheet of viscous fluid in the direction of gravity. If the gravitational field is sufficiently strong, then a portion of the sheet experiences a compressive stress and is thus unstable to transverse buckling. We analyse the dependence of the instability and the subsequent evolution on the process parameters, and the mutual coupling between the weakly nonlinear buckling and the stress profile in the sheet. Over long time scales, the sheet centreline ultimately adopts a universal profile, with the bulk of the sheet under tension and a single large bulge caused by a small compressive region near the bottom, and we derive a canonical inner problem that describes this behaviour. The large-time analysis involves a logarithmic asymptotic expansion, and we devise a hybrid asymptotic–numerical scheme that effectively sums the logarithmic series.

We present a combined theoretical and experimental study of lock-release inertial gravity currents (GCs) propagating in a horizontal channel of circular cross-section with open-top surface in the non-Boussinesq regime. A two-layer shallow-water (SW) model is developed for a generic shape of the cross-section with open top, and then implemented in a finite difference numerical code for the solution in a circular-cross-section channel of the type used in the experiments. The model predicts propagation with (almost) constant speed for a fairly long distance, accompanied by a depression of the ambient free open-top surface behind the front of the current. Sixteen experiments were conducted with a density ratio $r=0.587{-}0.939$ in full-depth and part-depth release conditions, measuring the front speed and the free-surface time series at four cross-sections. The channel was a circular tube 409 cm long, with a radius of 9.5 cm; the lengths of the locks were 52 and 103.5 cm. Density contrast was obtained by adding sodium chloride and dipotassium phosphate to fresh water. The theoretical values of the front speed and of the depression overestimate the experimental values, but they predict correctly their trend for varying parameters and provide reliable insights into the underlying mechanisms. In particular, we demonstrate that the circular cross-section increases the speed of propagation as compared to the standard rectangular cross-section case (for the same initial height and density ratio). The discrepancies between the SW predictions and the present experiments are of the same order of magnitude as those of previously published results for simpler systems (Boussinesq, rectangular). In addition to the depression, which is a wave bound to, and following the front of, the GC, the system also displays two kinds of free-surface waves, namely the initial bump (its amplitude is of the same order as the depression) and some short-length and low-amplitude waves in the tail of the bump. These free waves propagate with a celerity well predicted by the ‘fast’ eigenvalues of the mathematical model. Comparison is provided with the celerity of a solitary wave. It is expected that discrepancies between theory and experiments can be partly attributed to the presence of these waves. The reported insights and SW prediction method can be applied to a variety of cross-sections of practical interest (triangles, trapezoids, etc.).

In the drop-on-demand (DOD) inkjet system, deformation process and the direct relations between the droplet motions and the liquid properties have been seldom investigated, although they are very critical for the printing accuracy. In this study, experiments and computational simulations regarding deformation of a single droplet driven by a piezoelectric nozzle have been conducted to address the deformation characteristics of droplets. It is found that the droplet deformation is influenced by the pressure wave propagation in the ink channel related to the driven parameters and reflected in the subsequent droplet motions. The deformation extent oscillates with a certain period of $T$ and a decreasing amplitude as the droplet moves downwards. The deformation extent is found strongly dependent on the capillary number ($Ca$), first ascending and then descending as the number increases. The maximum value of the deformation extent is surprisingly found to be within range of 0.068–0.082 of the $Ca$ number regardless of other factors. Furthermore, the Rayleigh’s linear relation of the oscillation frequency of the droplet to the parameter, $\sqrt{\unicode[STIX]{x1D70E}/\unicode[STIX]{x1D70C}r^{3}}$ (where $\unicode[STIX]{x1D70E}$ is the surface tension coefficient, $\unicode[STIX]{x1D70C}$ is the density and $r$ is the droplet’s radius), is updated with a smaller slope shown both by experiment and simulation.

We present numerical and theoretical results concerning the properties of turbulent flows with strong multi-scale helical injection. We perform direct numerical simulations of the Navier–Stokes equations under a random helical stirring with power-law spectrum and with different intensities of energy and helicity injections. We show that there exists three different regimes where the forward energy and helicity inertial transfers are: (i) both leading with respect to the external injections, (ii) energy transfer is leading and helicity transfer is sub-leading and (iii) both are sub-leading and helicity is maximal at all scales. As a result, the cases (ii)–(iii) give flows with Kolmogorov-like inertial energy cascade and tuneable helicity transfers/contents. We further explore regime (iii) by studying its effect on the kinetics of point-like isotropic helicoids, particles whose dynamics is isotropic but breaks parity invariance. We investigate small-scale fractal clustering and preferential sampling of intense helical flow structures. Depending on their structural parameters, the isotropic helicoids either preferentially sample co-chiral or anti-chiral flow structures. We explain these findings in limiting cases in terms of what is known for spherical particles of different densities and degrees of inertia. Furthermore, we present theoretical and numerical results for a stochastic model where dynamical properties can be calculated using analytical perturbation theory. Our study shows that a suitable tuning of the stirring mechanism can strongly modify the small-scale turbulent helical properties and demonstrates that isotropic helicoids are the simplest particles able to preferentially sense helical properties in turbulence.

The detonation wave structure is analysed in a binary mixture undergoing a reversible chemical reaction represented by $A_{r}\rightleftharpoons A_{p}$. It is assumed that the flow satisfies the proper basic assumptions of the Zel’dovich–von Neumann–Döring (ZND) detonation model, namely the flow is one-dimensional and the shock is represented by a jump discontinuity, but the assumption of local thermodynamic equilibrium is disregarded. This allows us to deeply investigate the coupling between the detonation structure of overdriven detonations and its chemical kinetics. The thermodynamic non-equilibrium effects are taken into account in the mathematical description, using the model of a multi-temperature mixture developed within extended thermodynamics, which has been proved to be consistent with a kinetic theory approach. The reaction rate is then enriched with terms that take into account the temperatures of the constituents. The results show that the temperature difference between components within the detonation wave structure, which describes thermodynamic non-equilibrium, is driven by the chemical reaction. Numerical computations confirm the existence of non-monotonic profiles in the reaction zone of overdriven detonations which are sensitive to changes in the activation energy and reaction heat.

Wave run-up phenomena driven by nonlinear wave interactions with a fixed rectangular box are investigated. Experiments are carried out in different types of uni-directional waves with normal incidence. Significant wave run-ups featuring tertiary interaction effects, similar to those reported by Molin et al. (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 528, 2005, pp. 323–354) for a fixed vertical plate, are observed in regular wave tests. Transient wave group tests are conducted for comparison, to facilitate the analysis of the tertiary interactions in irregular waves. The most striking observation is that the wave surface elevations at the centre of the front face of the fixed box can reach $4\times$ the incident waves even in irregular waves, much larger than the ${\sim}2\times$ predicted from linear theory and observed for the transient groups. The extra amplification builds up slowly and is localized on the weather side of the box. It is believed to result from tertiary interactions between the incident and reflected wave fields upstream, which induce a local lensing effect and thus wave focusing on the weather side. These interactions, though a nonlinear process, occur at the first harmonic quantities rather than high harmonics. Supporting evidence is extracted from random wave runs using NewWave analysis, where surface amplifications and phase lag – both key characteristics of tertiary wave interactions – are identified. The identification of these tertiary interactions in irregular waves is new, and may be of practical importance.

Here we report the results of an experimental study where we measure the hydrodynamic force acting on a plate which is lifted from a water surface, suddenly starting to move upwards with an acceleration much larger than gravity. Our work focuses on the early stage of the plate motion, when the hydrodynamic suction forces due to the liquid inertia are the most relevant ones. Besides the force, we measure as well the acceleration at the centre of the plate and the time evolution of the wetted area. The results of this study show that, at very early stages, the hydrodynamic force can be estimated by a simple extension of the linear exit theory by Korobkin (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 737, 2013, pp. 368–386), which incorporates an added mass to the body dynamics. However, at longer times, the measured acceleration decays even though the applied external force continues to increase. Moreover, high-speed recordings of the disc displacement and the radius of the wetted area reveal that the latter does not change before the disc acceleration reaches its maximum value. We show in this paper that these phenomena are caused by the elastic deflection of the disc during the initial transient stage of water exit. We present a linearised model of water exit that accounts for the elastic behaviour of the lifted body. The results obtained with this new model agree fairly well with the experimental results.