We investigate aggregation and fragmentation dynamics of tracers and inertial aggregates in random flows leading to steady state size distributions. Our objective is to elucidate the impact of changes in aggregation rates, due to differences in advection dynamics, especially with respect to the influence of inertial effects. This aggregation process is, at the same time, balanced by fragmentation triggered by local hydrodynamic stress. Our study employs an individual-particle-based model, tracking position, velocity and size of each aggregate. We compare the steady-state size distribution formed by tracers and inertial aggregates, characterized by different sizes and densities. On the one hand, we show that the size distributions change their shape with changes of the dilution rate of the suspension. On the other hand, we obtain that the size distributions formed with different binding strengths between monomers can be rescaled to a single form with the use of a characteristic size for both dense inertial particles and tracer monomers. Nevertheless, this last scaling relation also fails if the size distribution contains aggregates that behave as tracer-like and as inertial-like, which results in a crossover between different scalings.
We study the mobility and the diffusion coefficient of an inertial tracer advected by a two-dimensional incompressible laminar flow, in the presence of thermal noise and under the action of an external force. We show, with extensive numerical simulations, that the force-velocity relation for the tracer, in the nonlinear regime, displays complex and rich behaviors, including negative differential and absolute mobility. These effects rely upon a subtle coupling between inertia and applied force which induce the tracer to persist in particular regions of phase space with a velocity opposite to th…
Inertial particles suspended in many natural and industrial flows undergo coagulation upon collisions and fragmentation if their size becomes too large or if they experience large shear. Here we study this coagulation-fragmentation process in time-periodic incompressible flows. We find that this process approaches an asymptotic, dynamical steady state where the average number of particles of each size is roughly constant. We compare the steady-state size distributions corresponding to two fragmentation mechanisms and for different flows and find that the steady state is mostly independent of t…
Inertial particles advected in chaotic flows often accumulate in strange attractors. While moving in these fractal sets they usually approach each other and collide. Here we consider inertial particles aggregating upon collision. The new particles formed in this process are larger and follow the equation of motion with a new parameter. These particles can in turn fragment when they reach a certain size or shear forces become sufficiently large. The resulting system consists of a large set of coexisting dynamical systems with a varying number of particles. We find that the combination of aggreg…
We report experimental results on the relative motion of pairs of solid spheric particles with initial separations in the inertial range of fully developed turbulence in water. The particle densities were in the range of $1 \lessapprox ρ_{p}/ρ_{f} \lessapprox 8$, \textit{i.e.}, from neutrally buoyant to highly inertial; and their sizes were of the Kolmogorov scale. For all particles, we observed a Batchelor like regime, in which particles separated ballistically. Similar to the Batchelor regime for tracers, this regime was observed in the early stages of the relative separation for times $t \l…
We formulate a data-driven, physics-constrained closure method for coarse-scale numerical simulations of turbulent fluid flows. Our approach involves a closure scheme that is non-local both in space and time, i.e. the closure terms are parametrized in terms of the spatial neighborhood of the resolved quantities but also their history. The data-driven scheme is complemented with a physical constrain expressing the energy conservation property of the nonlinear advection terms. We show that the adoption of this physical constrain not only increases the accuracy of the closure scheme but also impr…
Results from Direct Numerical Simulations of particle relative dispersion in three dimensional homogeneous and isotropic turbulence at Reynolds number $Re_λ\sim 300$ are presented. We study point-like passive tracers and heavy particles, at Stokes number St = 0, 0.6, 1 and 5. Particles are emitted from localised sources, in bunches of thousands, periodically in time, allowing to reach an unprecedented statistical accuracy, with a total number of events for two-point observables of the order of $10^{11}$. The right tail of the probability density function for tracers develops a clear deviation …
We investigate the large-scale transport of inertial particles. We derive explicit analytic expressions for the eddy diffusivities for generic Stokes times. These latter expressions are exact for any shear flow while they correspond to the leading contribution either in the deviation from the shear flow geometry or in the Péclet number of general random Gaussian velocity fields. Our explicit expressions allow us to investigate the role of inertia for such a class of flows and to make exact links with the analogous transport problem for tracer particles.
To understand the earliest stages of planet formation, it is crucial to be able to predict the rate and the outcome of dust grains collisions, be it sticking and growth, bouncing, or fragmentation. The outcome of such collisions depends on the collision speed, so we need a solid understanding of the rate and velocity distribution of turbulence-induced dust grain collisions. The rate of the collisions depends both on the speed of the collisions and the degree of clustering experienced by the dust grains, which is a known outcome of turbulence. We evolve the motion of dust grains in simulated tu…
We present the extension of a modeling technique for Lagrangian tracer particles [B. Viggiano et al., J. Fluid Mech.(2020), vol. 900, A27] which accounts for the effects of particle inertia. Thereby, the particle velocity for several Stokes numbers is modeled directly by a multi-layered Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process and a comparison of key statistical quantities (second-order velocity structure function, acceleration correlation function, and root mean square acceleration) to expressions derived from Batchelor's model as well as to direct numerical simulations (DNS) is performed. In both approach…
This work provides an experimental method for simultaneously measuring finite time Lyapunov exponent fields for multiple particle groups, including non-flow tracers, in three-dimensional multiphase flows. From sequences of particle images, e.g., from experimental fluid imaging techniques, we can directly compute the flow map and coherent structures, with out performing the computationally costly numerical integration. This is particularly useful to find three-dimensional Lagrangian coherent structures for inertial particles, that do not follow the bulk fluid velocity, as we demonstrate for a g…
We analyze the evolution of the distribution, both in the phase space and in the physical space, of inertial particles released by a spatially-localized (punctual) source and advected by an incompressible flow. The difference in mass density between fluid and particles is assumed as small, and represents the basic parameter for a regular perturbative expansion. By means of analytical techniques such as Hermitianization, we derive a chain of equations of the advection--diffusion--reaction type, easily solvable at least numerically. Our procedure provides results also for finite particle inertia…
Inertial particles in stably stratified flows play a fundamental role in geophysics, from the dynamics of nutrients in the ocean to the dispersion of pollutants in the atmosphere. We consider the Maxey-Riley equation for small neutrally buoyant inertial particles in the Boussinesq approximation, and discuss its limits of validity. We show that particles behave as forced damped oscillators, with different regimes depending on the particles Stokes number and the fluid Brunt-Väisälä frequency. Using direct numerical simulations we study the particles dynamics and we show that small neutrally buoy…
We investigate the bounds between normal or anomalous effective diffusion for inertial particles transported by parallel flows. The infrared behavior of the fluid kinetic-energy spectrum, i.e. the possible presence of long-range spatio-temporal correlations, is modeled as a power law by means of two parameters, and the problem is studied as a function of these latter. Our results, obtained in the limit of weak relative inertia, extend well-known results for tracers and apply to particles of any mass density, subject to gravity and Brownian diffusion. We consider both steady and time-dependent …
We present a model for the Lagrangian dynamics of inertial particles in a compressible flow, where fluid velocity gradients are modelled by a telegraph noise. The model allows for an analytic investigation of the role of time correlation of the flow in the aggregation-disorder transition of inertial particle. The dependence on Stokes and Kubo numbers of the Lyapunov exponent of particle trajectories reveals the presence of a region in parameter space (St, Ku) where the leading Lyapunov exponent changes sign, thus signaling the transition. The asymptotics of short and long-correlated flows are …
We report a novel experimental technique that measures simultaneously in three dimensions the trajectories, the translation, and the rotation of finite size inertial particles together with the turbulent flow. The flow field is analyzed by tracking the temporal evolution of small fluorescent tracer particles. The inertial particles consist of a super-absorbent polymer that renders them index and density matched with water and thus invisible. The particles are marked by inserting at various locations tracer particles into the polymer. Translation and rotation, as well as the flow field around t…
This work focuses on buoyant tracers floating on the ocean surface and treats the geostrophic and ageostrophic surface velocities as the 2D solenoidal (non-divergent) and potential (divergent) flow components, respectively. We consider a random kinematic flow model and study the process of clustering, that is, aggregation of tracers in localized spatial patches. An asymptotic theory exists only for strongly divergent velocity fields and predicts complete clustering, that is, emergence in the large-time limit of spatial singularities containing all available tracers. To extend the theory, we co…
Collisions between a stream of drops and a continuous jet of a different liquid are experimentally investigated. In contrast to previous studies, our work focuses on the effects of liquid miscibility and wettability on the collision outcomes. Thus, miscible and immiscible liquids providing total and partial wetting are used. We show that, as long as the jet surface tension is smaller than the drop surface tension, the drops can be encapsulated by the jet, providing the so-called drops-in-jet structure. The transitions between the different regimes remain similar in nature with a capillary frag…
The incorporation of particle inertia into the usual mean field theory for particle aggregation and fragmentation in fluid flows is still an unsolved problem. We therefore suggest an alternative approach that is based on the dynamics of individual inertial particles and apply this to study steady state particle size distributions in a 3-d synthetic turbulent flow. We show how a fractal-like structure, typical of aggregates in natural systems, can be incorporated in an approximate way into the aggregation and fragmentation model by introducing effective densities and radii. We apply this model …
Advection-diffusion problems of magnetic field and tracer field are analyzed using the field theoretic perturbative renormalization group. Both advected fields are considered to be passive, i.e., without any influence on the turbulent environment, and advecting velocity field is generated by compressible version of stochastic Navier-Stokes equation. The model is considered in the vicinity of space dimension $d=4$ and is a continuation of previous work [N.V. Antonov et al., Phys. Rev. E 95, 033120 (2017)]. The perturbation theory near the special dimension $d=4$ is constructed within a double e…
Inertial pumping is a promising new method of moving fluids through microchannels but many of its properties remain unexplored. In this work, inertial flow rates are investigated for different channel lengths, operating temperatures, and resistor pulse energies. Flow in closed channels is visualized by adding fluorescent tracer beads to the test fluid (pure water). A robust methodology of extracting flow rates from high-resolution video recordings is developed. Flow rates are found to scale inversely with the channel length. The observed dependence is explained based on a simple phenomenologic…
We present a model for the relative velocity of inertial particles in turbulent flows. Our general formulation shows that the relative velocity has contributions from two terms, referred to as the generalized acceleration and generalized shear terms, because they reduce to the well known acceleration and shear terms in the Saffman-Turner limit. The generalized shear term represents particles' memory of the flow velocity difference along their trajectories and depends on the inertial particle pair dispersion backward in time. The importance of this backward dispersion in determining the particl…
This work considers the distribution of inertial particles in turbulence using the point-particle approximation. We demonstrate that the random point process formed by the positions of particles in space is a Poisson point process with log-normal random intensity ("log Gaussian Cox process" or LGCP). The probability of having a finite number of particles in a small volume is given in terms of the characteristic function of a log-normal distribution. Corrections due to discreteness of the number of particles to the previously derived statistics of particle concentration in the continuum limit a…
The so-called Landau-Levich-Deryaguin problem treats the coating flow dynamics of a thin viscous liquid film entrained by a moving solid surface. In this context, we use a simple experimental set-up consisting of a partially-immersed rotating disc in a liquid tank to study the role of inertia, and also curvature, on liquid entrainment. Using water and UCON$^{\mbox{TM}}$ mixtures, we point out a rich phenomenology in the presence of strong inertia : ejection of multiple liquid sheets on the emerging side of the disc, sheet fragmentation, ligament formation and atomization of the liquid flux ent…
We present a comparison of different particles' velocity and acceleration statistics in two paradigmatic turbulent swirling flows: the von Kármán flow in a laboratory experiment, and the Taylor-Green flow in direct numerical simulations. Tracers, as well as inertial particles, are considered. Results indicate that, in spite of the differences in boundary conditions and forcing mechanisms, scaling properties and statistical quantities reveal similarities between both flows, pointing to new methods to calibrate and compare models for particles dynamics in numerical simulations, as well as to cha…
By tracking tracer particles at high speeds and for long times, we study the geometric statistics of Lagrangian trajectories in an intensely turbulent laboratory flow. In particular, we consider the distinction between the displacement of particles from their initial positions and the total distance they travel. The difference of these two quantities shows power-law scaling in the inertial range. By comparing them with simulations of a chaotic but non-turbulent flow and a Lagrangian Stochastic model, we suggest that our results are a signature of turbulence.
A growing body of work on the dynamics of eukaryotic flagella has noted that their oscillation frequencies are sufficiently high that the viscous penetration depth of unsteady Stokes flow is comparable to the scales over which flagella synchronize. Incorporating these effects into theories of synchronization requires an understanding of the global unsteady flows around oscillating bodies. Yet, there has been no precise experimental test on the microscale of the most basic aspects of such unsteady Stokes flow: the orbits of passive tracers and the position-dependent phase lag between the oscill…
We describe the structure and dynamics of turbulence by the scale-dependent perceived velocity gradient tensor as supported by following four tracers, i.e. fluid particles, that initially form a regular tetrahedron. We report results from experiments in a von Kármán swirling water flow and from numerical simulations of the incompressible Navier-Stokes equation. We analyze the statistics and the dynamics of the perceived rate of strain tensor and vorticity for initially regular tetrahedron of size $r_0$ from the dissipative to the integral scale. Just as for the true velocity gradient, at any i…
The conditions allowing particle suspension in turbulent flow are of interest in many applications, but understanding them is complicated both by the nature of turbulence and by the interaction of flow with particles. Observations on small particles indicate an invariance of acceleration PDFs of small particles independent of size. We show to be true the postulated role of particle/fluid interaction forces in maintaining suspension. The 3D-PTV method, applied for two particle phases (tracers and inertial particles) simultaneously, was used to obtain velocity and acceleration data, and through …
We present the results of Direct Numerical Simulations (DNS) of turbulent flows seeded with millions of passive inertial particles. The maximum Taylor's Reynolds number is around 200. We consider particles much heavier than the carrier flow in the limit when the Stokes drag force dominates their dynamical evolution. We discuss both the transient and the stationary regimes. In the transient regime, we study the growt of inhomogeneities in the particle spatial distribution driven by the preferential concentration out of intense vortex filaments. In the stationary regime, we study the acceleratio…
We show and explain how a long bead-spring chain, immersed in a homogeneous, isotropic turbulent flow, preferentially samples vortical flow structures. We begin with an elastic, extensible chain which is stretched out by the flow, up to inertial-range scales. This filamentary object, which is known to preferentially sample the circular coherent vortices of two-dimensional (2D) turbulence, is shown here to also preferentially sample the intense, tubular, vortex filaments of 3D turbulence. In the 2D case, the chain collapses into a tracer inside vortices. In 3D, on the contrary, the chain is ext…
Lagrangian statistics and particle transport in edge plasma turbulence are investigated using the Hasegawa-Wakatani model and its modified version. The latter shows the emergence of pronounced zonal flows. Different values of the adiabaticity parameter are considered. The main goal is to characterize the role of coherent structures, i.e., vortices and zonal flows, and their impact on the Lagrangian statistics of particles. Computationally intensive long time simulations following ensembles of test particles over hundreds of eddy turnover times are considered in statistically stationary turbule…
