| Metamorphosis of a Hairpin Vortex into a Young Turbulent Spot (1995) | |||||||||||||||||
Abstract | |||||||||||||||||
| Direct numerical simulation was used to study the formation and growth of a hairpin vortex in a flat-plate boundary layer and its later development into a young turbulent spot. Fluid injection through a slit in the wall triggered the initial vortex. The legs of the vortex were stretched into a hairpin shape as it traveled downstream. Multiple hairpin vortex heads developed between the stretched legs. New vortices formed beneath the streamwise-elongated vortex legs. The continued development of additional vortices resulted in the formation of a traveling region of highly disturbed flow with an arrowhead shape similar to that of a turbulent spot. 1 Introduction Hairpin and horseshoe vortices have been proposed as primary structures in turbulent and transitional boundary layers since Theodorsen [1]. In windtunnel experiments, Head and Bandyopadhyay [2] observed hairpin and horseshoe vortices in high Reynolds number, turbulent boundary layers. In flowvisualization studies of turbulent sp... | |||||||||||||||||
Publication details | |||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||