Extreme dissipation event due to plume collision in a turbulent convection cell

Jörg Schumacher and Janet D. Scheel
Phys. Rev. E 94, 043104 – Published 10 October 2016

Abstract

An extreme dissipation event in the bulk of a closed three-dimensional turbulent convection cell is found to be correlated with a strong reduction of the large-scale circulation flow in the system that happens at the same time as a plume emission event from the bottom plate. The reduction in the large-scale circulation opens the possibility for a nearly frontal collision of down- and upwelling plumes and the generation of a high-amplitude thermal dissipation layer in the bulk. This collision is locally connected to a subsequent high-amplitude energy dissipation event in the form of a strong shear layer. Our analysis illustrates the impact of transitions in the large-scale structures on extreme events at the smallest scales of the turbulence, a direct link that is observed in a flow with boundary layers. We also show that detection of extreme dissipation events which determine the far-tail statistics of the dissipation fields in the bulk requires long-time integrations of the equations of motion over at least a hundred convective time units.

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  • Received 10 March 2016

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.94.043104

©2016 American Physical Society

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

  1. Research Areas
  1. Techniques
Fluid Dynamics

Authors & Affiliations

Jörg Schumacher1 and Janet D. Scheel2

  • 1Institut für Thermo- und Fluiddynamik, Technische Universität Ilmenau, Postfach 100565, D-98684 Ilmenau, Germany
  • 2Department of Physics, Occidental College, 1600 Campus Road, M21, Los Angeles, California 90041, USA

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Issue

Vol. 94, Iss. 4 — October 2016

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