Turbulent spot growth in plane Couette flow: statistical study and formation of spanwise vorticity

Abstract

This article presents direct numerical simulations of the growth of turbulent spots in the transitional regime of plane Couette flow. A quantitative description of the growth process and of the detail of the quadrupolar flow around the spot is given. Focus is put on formation of spanwise vorticity in the velocity streaks that resembles a secondary shear instability. The main features of the instability (coherence lengths, advection velocity) are studied in the context of the turbulent spot, below and above the threshold Reynolds number of appearance of the oblique turbulent bands of plane Couette flow.

10 pages, 9 figures

References in corpus (3)

• Large scale flow around turbulent spots
• Ginzburg--Landau description of laminar-turbulent oblique band formation in transitional plane Couette flow
• Pattern fluctuations in transitional plane Couette flow

Cited by in corpus (3)

• Mechanical and statistical study of the laminar hole formation in transitional plane Couette flow
• Formation of spanwise vorticy in oblique turbulent bands of transitional plane Couette flow, part 1: Numerical experiments
• Formation of spanwise vorticity in oblique turbulent bands of transitional plane Couette flow, part 2: modelling and stability analysis