An enstrophy cascade is exhibited for the Navier-Stokes equations in physical scales independently of boundary conditions under physically reasonable assumptions on the flow.
By direct numerical simulation to the two-dimensional Navier-Stokes equations with small-scale forcing and large-scale damping, Xiao-Wan-Chen-Eyink (2009) found an evidence that inverse energy cascade may proceed with the vortex thinning mechanism. On the other hand, Alexakis-Doering (2006) calculated upper bound of the bulk averaged enstrophy dissipation rate of the steady-state two dimensional turbulence. {In this paper, we show that vortex thinning induces enhanced dissipation with strictly slower vanishing order of the enstrophy dissipation than $Re^{-1}$.}
This investigation concerns a systematic search for potentially singular behavior in 3D Navier-Stokes flows. Enstrophy serves as a convenient indicator of the regularity of solutions to the Navier Stokes system --- as long as this quantity remains finite, the solutions are guaranteed to be smooth and satisfy the equations in the classical (pointwise) sense. However, there are no estimates available with finite a priori bounds on the growth of enstrophy and hence the regularity problem for the 3D Navier-Stokes system remains open. In order to quantify the maximum possible growth of enstrophy, w…
Bounding curves in the energy,enstrophy-plane are derived for the 3D Navier-Stokes equations under an assumption on coherence of the vorticity direction. The analysis in the critical case where the direction is Hölder continuous with exponent $r=1/2$ results in a curve with extraordinarily large maximal enstrophy (exponential in Grashof), in marked contrast to the subcritical case, $r>1/2$ (algebraic in Grashof).
We consider enstrophy dissipation in two-dimensional (2D) Navier-Stokes flows and focus on how this quantity behaves in thelimit of vanishing viscosity. After recalling a number of a priori estimates providing lower and upper bounds on this quantity, we state an optimization problem aimed at probing the sharpness of these estimates as functions of viscosity. More precisely, solutions of this problem are the initial conditions with fixed palinstrophy and possessing the property that the resulting 2D Navier-Stokes flows locally maximize the enstrophy dissipation over a given time window. This pr…
Existence of 2D enstrophy cascade in a suitable mathematical setting, and under suitable conditions compatible with 2D turbulence phenomenology, is known both in the Fourier and in the physical scales. The goal of this paper is to show that the same geometric condition preventing the formation of singularities - 1/2-Hölder coherence of the vorticity direction - coupled with a suitable condition on a modified Kraichnan scale, and under a certain modulation assumption on evolution of the vorticity, leads to existence of 3D enstrophy cascade in physical scales of the flow.
Current theoretical results for the three-dimensional Navier--Stokes equations only guarantee that solutions remain regular for all time when the initial enstrophy ($\|Du_0\|^2:=\int|{\rm curl} u_0|^2$) is sufficiently small, $\|Du_0\|^2\leχ_0$. In fact, this smallness condition is such that the enstrophy is always non-increasing. In this paper we provide a numerical procedure that will verify regularity of solutions for any bounded set of initial conditions, $\|Du_0\|^2\leχ_1$. Under the assumption that the equations are in fact regular we show that this procedure can be guaranteed to termina…
Computational simulations of turbulent flows indicate that the regions of low dissipation/enstrophy production feature high degree of local alignment between the velocity and the vorticty, i.e., the flow is locally near-Beltrami. Hence one could envision a geometric scenario in which the persistence of the local near-Beltramy property might be consistent with a (possible) finite-time singularity formation. The goal of this note is to show that this scenario is in fact prohibited if the sine of the angle between the velocity and the vorticty is small enough with respect to the local enstrophy.
We consider the inviscid limit of the stochastic damped 2D Navier- Stokes equations. We prove that, when the viscosity vanishes, the stationary solution of the stochastic damped Navier-Stokes equations converges to a stationary solution of the stochastic damped Euler equation and that the rate of dissipation of enstrophy converges to zero. In particular, this limit obeys an enstrophy balance. The rates are computed with respect to a limit measure of the unique invariant measure of the stochastic damped Navier-Stokes equations.
We consider the zero viscosity limit of long time averages of solutions of damped and driven Navier-Stokes equations in ${\mathbb R}^2$. We prove that the rate of dissipation of enstrophy vanishes. Stationary statistical solutions of the damped and driven Navier-Stokes equations converge to renormalized stationary statistical solutions of the damped and driven Euler equations. These solutions obey the enstrophy balance.
Local analysis of the two dimensional Navier-Stokes equations is used to obtain estimates on the energy and enstrophy fluxes involving Taylor and Kraichnan length scales and the size of the domain. In the framework of zero driving force and non-increasing global energy, these bounds produce sufficient conditions for existence of the direct enstrophy and inverse energy cascades. Several manifestations of locality of the fluxes under these conditions are obtained. All the scales involved are actual physical scales in R^2 and no homogeneity assumptions are made.
We introduce a rough perturbation of the Navier-Stokes system and justify its physical relevance from balance of momentum and conservation of circulation in the inviscid limit. We present a framework for a well-posedness analysis of the system. In particular, we define an intrinsic notion of solution based on ideas from the rough path theory and study the system in an equivalent vorticity formulation. In two space dimensions, we prove that well-posedness and enstrophy balance holds. Moreover, we derive rough path continuity of the equation, which yields a Wong-Zakai result for Brownian driving…
We provide sufficient conditions for mathematically rigorous proofs of the third order universal laws capturing the energy flux to large scales and enstrophy flux to small scales for statistically stationary, forced-dissipated 2d Navier-Stokes equations in the large-box limit. These laws should be regarded as 2d turbulence analogues of the $4/5$ law in 3d turbulence, predicting a constant flux of energy and enstrophy (respectively) through the two inertial ranges in the dual cascade of 2d turbulence. Conditions implying only one of the two cascades are also obtained, as well as compactness cri…
In this paper, we deal with the controllability properties of a system of $m$ coupled Stokes systems or $m$ coupled Navier-Stokes systems. We show the null-controllability of such systems in the case where the coupling is in a cascade form and when the control acts only on one of the systems. Moreover, we impose that this control has a vanishing component so that we control a $m\times N$ state (corresponding to the velocities of the fluids) by $N-1$ distributed scalar controls. The proof of the controllability of the coupled Stokes system is based on a Carleman estimate for the adjoint system.…
We consider the behaviour of weak solutions of the unforced three-dimensional Navier-Stokes equations, under the assumption that the initial condition has finite energy ($\|u\|^2=\int|u|^2$) but infinite enstrophy ($\|Du\|^2=\int|{\rm curl} u|^2$). We show that this has to be reflected in the solution for small times, so that in particular $\|Du(t)\|\to+\infty$ as $t\to0$. We also give some limitations on this `backwards blowup', and give an elementary proof that the upper box-counting dimension of the set of singular times can be no larger than one half. Although similar in flavour, this fina…
The Navier-Stokes equations and their various approximations can be described in terms of near identity maps, that are diffusive particle path transformations of physical space. The active velocity is obtained from the diffusive path transformation and a virtual velocity using the Weber formula. The active vorticity is obtained from the diffusive path transformation and a virtual vorticity using a Cauchy formula. The virtual velocity and the virtual vorticity obey diffusive equations, which reduce to passive advection formally, if the viscosity is zero. Apart from being proportional to the vis…
This manuscript derives an evolution equation for the symmetric part of the gradient of the velocity (the strain tensor) in the incompressible Navier-Stokes equation on $\mathbb{R}^3$, and proves the existence of $L^2$ mild solutions to this equation. We use this equation to obtain a simplified identity for the growth of enstrophy for mild solutions that depends only on the strain tensor, not on the nonlocal interaction of the strain tensor with the vorticity. The resulting identity allows us to prove a new family of scale-critical, necessary and sufficient conditions for the blow-up of a solu…
In this paper, we deal with the existence of insensitizing controls for the Navier-Stokes equations in a bounded domain with Dirichlet boundary conditions. We prove that there exist controls insensitizing the $L^2$ -norm of the observation of the solution in an open subset $\mathcal{O}$ of the domain, under suitable assumptions on the data. This problem is equivalent to an exact controllability result for a cascade system. First we prove a global Carleman inequality for the linearized Navier-Stokes system with right-hand side, which leads to the null controllability at any time $T>0$. Then, we…
This article is devoted to incompressible Euler equations (or to Navier-Stokes equations in the vanishing viscosity limit). It describes the propagation of quasi-singularities. The underlying phenomena are consistent with the notion of a cascade of energy.
We define the Ladyzhenskaya-Lions exponent $α_{\rm {\tiny \sc l}} (n)=({2+n})/4$ for Navier-Stokes equations with dissipation $-(-Δ)^α$ in ${\Bbb R}^n$, for all $n\geq 2$. We review the proof of strong global solvability when $α\geq α_{\rm {\tiny \sc l}} (n)$, given smooth initial data. If the corresponding Euler equations for $n>2$ were to allow uncontrolled growth of the enstrophy ${1\over 2} \|\nabla u \|^2_{L^2}$, then no globally controlled coercive quantity is currently known to exist that can regularize solutions of the Navier-Stokes equations for $α<α_{\rm {\tiny \sc l}} (n)$. The ener…
In this investigation we perform a systematic computational search for potential singularities in 3D Navier-Stokes flows based on the Ladyzhenskaya-Prodi-Serrin conditions. They assert that if the quantity $\int_0^T \| \mathbf{u}(t) \|_{L^q(Ω)}^p \, dt$, where $2/p+3/q \le 1$, $q > 3$, is bounded, then the solution $\mathbf{u}(t)$ of the Navier-Stokes system is smooth on the interval $[0,T]$. In other words, if a singularity should occur at some time $t \in [0,T]$, then this quantity must be unbounded. We have probed this condition by studying a family of variational PDE optimization problems …
We show - in the framework of physical scales and $(K_1,K_2)$-averages - that Kolmogorov's dissipation law combined with the smallness condition on a Taylor length scale are sufficient to guarantee energy cascades in the forced Navier-Stokes equations. Moreover, in the periodic case we establish restrictive scaling laws - in terms of Grashof number - for kinetic energy, energy flux, and energy dissipation rate. These are used to improve our sufficient condition for forced cascades in physical scales.
Rigorous estimates for the total - (kinetic) energy plus pressure - flux in R^3 are obtained from the three dimensional Navier-Stokes equations. The bounds are used to establish a condition - involving Taylor length scale and the size of the domain - sufficient for existence of the inertial range and the energy cascade in decaying turbulence (zero driving force, non-increasing global energy). Several manifestations of the locality of the flux under this condition are obtained. All the scales involved are actual physical scales in R^3 and no regularity or homogeneity/scaling assumptions are mad…
In this paper we establish a number of implications between various qualitative and quantitative versions of the global regularity problem for the Navier-Stokes equations, in the periodic, smooth finite energy, smooth $H^1$, Schwartz, or mild $H^1$ categories, and with or without a forcing term. In particular, we show that if one has global well-posedness in $H^1$ for the periodic Navier-Stokes problem with a forcing term, then one can obtain global regularity both for periodic and for Schwartz initial data (thus yielding a positive answer to both official formulations of the problem for the C…
The one-dimensional quasi-geostrophic equation is the one-dimensional Fourier-space analogue of the famous Navier-Stokes equations. In their work Li and Sinai have proposed a renormalization approach to the problem of existence of finite-time blow up solutions of this equation. In this setting, existence of finite time blow ups is a consequence of existence of a fixed point for a certain renormalization operator on an appropriate functional space. They have provided a proof of existence of complex-valued finite time blow up solutions of the quasi-geostrophic equation. In this paper we revisit …
The existence of weak solutions to the stationary Navier-Stokes equations in the whole plane $\mathbb{R}^2$ is proven. This particular geometry was the only case left open since the work of Leray in 1933. The reason is that due to the absence of boundaries the local behavior of the solutions cannot be controlled by the enstrophy in two dimensions. We overcome this difficulty by constructing approximate weak solutions having a prescribed mean velocity on some given bounded set. As a corollary, we obtain infinitely many weak solutions in $\mathbb{R}^2$ parameterized by this mean velocity, which …
The paper explores the symbiotic relation between the Navier-Stokes equations and the associated stochastic cascades. Specifically, we examine how some well-known existence and uniqueness results for the Navier-Stokes equations can inform about the probabilistic features of the associated stochastic cascades, and how some probabilistic features of the stochastic cascades can, in turn, inform about the existence and uniqueness (or the lack thereof) of solutions. Our method of incorporating the stochastic explosion gives a simpler and more natural method to construct the solution compared to the…
The present article establishes connections between the structure of the deterministic Navier-Stokes equations and the structure of (similarity) equations that govern self-similar solutions as expected values of certain naturally associated stochastic cascades. A principle result is that explosion criteria for the stochastic cascades involved in the probabilistic representations of solutions to the respective equations coincide. While the uniqueness problem itself remains unresolved, these connections provide interesting problems and possible methods for investigating symmetry breaking and the…
Orbit-Level Transfer Matrix for the 3D Fourier-Galerkin Navier-Stokes System on the Periodic Torus: Explicit Orbit-Triad Incidence Bounds and Deterministic Row-Sum Estimates