Turbulent fluctuations around Bjorken flow

Abstract

We study the evolution of local event-by-event deviations from smooth average fluid dynamic fields, as they can arise in heavy ion collisions from the propagation of fluctuating initial conditions. Local fluctuations around Bjorken flow are found to be governed by non-linear equations whose solutions can be characterized qualitatively in terms of Reynolds numbers. Perturbations at different rapidities decouple quickly, and satisfy (after suitable coordinate transformations) an effectively two-dimensional Navier-Stokes equation of non-relativistic form. We discuss the conditions under which non-linearities in these equations cannot be neglected and turbulent behavior is expected to set in.

4 pages, 2 figures - To appear in the conference proceedings for Quark Matter 2011, May 23 - May 28, Annecy, France

References in corpus (4)

• Collision geometry fluctuations and triangular flow in heavy-ion collisions
• Triangular flow in event-by-event ideal hydrodynamics in Au+Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\mathrm{NN}}}=200A$ GeV
• Event-by-event hydrodynamics and elliptic flow from fluctuating initial state
• Importance of Granular Structure in the Initial Conditions for the Elliptic Flow

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• Viscous potential flow analysis of peripheral heavy ion collisions
• Collective Flow Global Collective Flow in Heavy Ion Reactions from the Beginnings to the Future
• Study of Rotating High Energy Systems with the Differential HBT Method
• An Initial State with Shear in Peripheral Heavy Ion Collisions