The linear stability of a rotating, stratified, inviscid horizontal plane Couette flow in a channel is studied in the limit of strong rotation and stratification. An energy argument is used to show that unstable perturbations must have large wavenumbers. This motivates the use of a WKB-approach which, in the first instance, provides an approximation for the dispersion relation of the various waves that can propagate in the flow. These are Kelvin waves, trapped near the channel walls, and inertia-gravity waves with or without turning points.
Although, the wave phase speeds are found to be real to all algebraic orders in the Rossby number, we establish that the flow, whether cyclonic or anticyclonic, is unconditionally unstable. This is the result of linear resonances between waves with oppositely signed wave momenta. We derive asymptotic estimates for the instability growth rates, which are exponentially small in the Rossby number, and confirm them by numerical computations. Our results, which extend those of Kushner et al (1998) and Yavneh et al (2001), highlight the limitations of the so-called balanced models, widely used in geophysical fluid dynamics, which filter out Kelvin and inertia-gravity waves and hence predict the stability of the Couette flow. They are also relevant to the stability of Taylor-Couette flows and of astrophysical accretion discs.
Most idealized studies of stratified shear instabilities assume that the shear interface and the buoyancy interface are coincident. We discuss the role of asymmetry on the evolution of shear instabilities. Using linear stability theory and direct numerical simulations, we show that asymmetric shear instabilities exhibit features of both Holmboe and Kelvin-Helmholtz (KH) instabilities, and develop a framework to determine whether the instabilities are more Holmboe-like or more KH-like. Further, the asymmetric instabilities produce asymmetric mixing that exhibits features of both overturning and…
Numerical simulations of stratified shear flow instabilities are performed in two dimensions in the Boussinesq limit. The density variation length scale is chosen to be four times smaller than the velocity variation length scale so that Holmboe or Kelvin-Helmholtz unstable modes are present depending on the choice of the global Richardson number Ri. Three different values of Ri were examined Ri =0.2, 2, 20. The flows for the three examined values are all unstable due to different modes namely: the Kelvin-Helmholtz mode for Ri=0.2, the first Holmboe mode for Ri=2, and the second Holmboe mode fo…
We consider turbulence in a stratified 'Kolmogorov' flow, driven by horizontal shear in the form of sinusoidal body forcing in the presence of an imposed background linear stable stratification in the third direction. This flow configuration allows the controlled investigation of the formation of coherent structures, which here organise the flow into horizontal layers by inclining the background shear as the strength of the stratifica- tion is increased. By numerically converging exact steady states from direct numerical simulations of chaotic flow, we show, for the first time, a robust connec…
Effects of the baroclinic torque on wave propagation normally neglected under the Boussinesq approximation is investigated here, with a special focus on the associated consequences for the mechanistic interpretation of shear instability arising from the interaction between a pair of vorticity-propagating waves. To illustrate and elucidate the physical effects that modify wave propagation, we consider three examples of increasing complexity: wave propagation supported by a uniform background flow; wave propagation supported on a piecewise-linear basic state possessing one jump; and an instabili…
Holmboe (1962) postulated that resonant interaction between two or more progressive, linear interfacial waves produces exponentially growing instabilities in idealized (broken-line profiles), homogeneous or density stratified, inviscid shear layers. In this paper, we generalize Holmboe's mechanistic picture of linear shear instabilities by (i) not initially specifying the type of the waves, and (ii) by providing the option for non-normal growth. We demonstrate the mechanism behind linear shear instabilities by proposing a purely kinematic model consisting of two linear, Doppler-shifted, progre…
We present a numerical investigation of three-dimensional, short-wavelength linear instabilities in Kelvin-Helmholtz (KH) vortices in homogeneous and stratified environments. The base flow, generated using two-dimensional numerical simulations, is characterized by the Reynolds number and the Richardson number defined based on the initial one-dimensional velocity and buoyancy profiles. The local stability equations are then solved on closed streamlines in the vortical base flow, which is assumed quasi-steady. For the unstratified case, the elliptic instability at the vortex core dominates at ea…
Highly stratified shear layers are rendered unstable even at high stratifications by Holmboe instabilities when the density stratification is concentrated in a small region of the shear layer. These instabilities may cause mixing in highly stratified environments. However these instabilities occur in limited bands in the parameter space. We perform Generalized Stability analysis of the two dimensional perturbation dynamics of an inviscid Boussinesq stratified shear layer and show that Holmboe instabilities at high Richardson numbers can be excited by their adjoints at amplitudes that are order…
Here we have considered the effects of shallowness of the domain as well as the air-water free surface on the stratified shear instabilities of the fluid underneath. First, we numerically solve the non-Boussinesq Taylor-Goldstein equation for smooth velocity and density profiles of a model shear layer with a free surface. When the depth of the fluid is relatively shallow compared to the shear layer thickness, the surface gravity waves existing at the free surface come closer to the waves existing in the shear layer. This can lead to resonant wave interactions, making the flow unstable to more …
Instability of stratified multi-phase flow in a rotating platform becomes important because of a potential role in micro-mixing and micro-machines. Centrifugal actuation can play an important role in driving the flow and Coriolis force can enhance the mixing in a short span by destabilizing the flow. In this study, we focus on the impact of the Coriolis force on a rotating viscosity-stratified flow with a thin diffusive mixed layer between two fluid layers. Modal stability analysis is used to estimate the critical parameters, namely Rotation number, Reynolds number, and wave number, which are …
Stationary longitudinal vortical rolls emerge in katabatic and anabatic Prandtl slope flows due to the dominance of the normal component of the buoyancy force over flow shear. Here, we further identify self pairing of these longitudinal rolls as a unique flow structure. The topology of the counter-rotating vortex pair bears a striking resemblance to speaker-wires and their interaction with each other is a precursor to further destabilization and breakdown of the flow field into smaller structures. On its own, a speaker-wire vortex retains its unique topology without any vortex reconnection or …
The stratified inclined duct (SID) sustains an exchange flow in a long, gently sloping duct as a model for continuously-forced density-stratified flows such as those found in estuaries. Experiments have shown that the emergence of interfacial waves and their transition to turbulence as the tilt angle is increased appears linked to a threshold in the exchange flow rate given by inviscid two-layer hydraulics. We uncover these hydraulic mechanisms with (i) recent direct numerical simulations (DNS) providing full flow data in the key flow regimes (Zhu & Atoufi et al., arXiv:2301.09773, 2023), (ii)…
The present article investigates the interactions between the pilot and main flames in a novel stratified swirl burner using both experimental and numerical methods. Experiments are conducted in a test rig operating at atmospheric conditions. The system is equipped with the BASIS (Beihang Axial Swirler Independently-Stratified) burner fuelled with premixed methane-air mixtures. To illustrate the interactions between the pilot and main flames, three operating modes are studied, where the burner works with: (i) only the pilot flame, (ii) only the main flame, and (iii) the stratified flame (with …
Interfaces between stratified epithelia and their supporting stromas commonly exhibit irregular shapes. Undulations are particularly pronounced in dysplastic tissues and typically evolve into long, finger-like protrusions in carcinomas. In a previous work (Basan et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 106, 158101 (2011)), we demonstrated that an instability arising from viscous shear stresses caused by the constant flow due to cell turnover in the epithelium could drive this phenomenon. While interfacial tension between the two tissues as well as mechanical resistance of the stroma tend to maintain a flat in…
Marangoni instabilities can emerge when a liquid interface is subjected to a concentration or temperature gradient. It is generally believed that for these instabilities bulk effects like buoyancy are negligible as compared to interfacial forces, especially on small scales. Consequently, the effect of a stable stratification on the Marangoni instability has hitherto been ignored. Here we report, for an immiscible drop immersed in a stably stratified ethanol-water mixture, a new type of oscillatory solutal Marangoni instability which is triggered once the stratification has reached a critical v…
For an immiscible oil drop immersed in a stably stratified ethanol-water mixture, a downwards solutal Marangoni flow is generated on the surface of the drop, owing to the concentration gradient, and the resulting propulsion competes against the downwards gravitational acceleration of the heavy drop. In prior work of Li et al. (Phys. Rev. Lett., vol. 126, issue 12, 2021, 124502), we found that for drops of low viscosity, an oscillatory instability of the Marangoni flow is triggered once the Marangoni advection is too strong for diffusion to restore the stratified concentration field around the …
We consider the influence of transverse confinement on the instability properties of velocity and density distributions reminiscent of those pertaining to exchange flows in stratified inclined ducts, such as the recent experiment of Lefauve et al. (J. Fluid Mech. 848, 508-544, 2018). Using a normal mode streamwise and temporal expansion for flows in ducts with various aspect ratios $B$ and non-trivial transverse velocity profiles, we calculate two-dimensional (2D) dispersion relations with associated eigenfunctions varying in the 'crosswise' direction, in which the density varies, and the span…
Stably stratified layers are present in stellar interiors (radiative zones) as well as planetary interiors - recent observations and theoretical studies of the Earth's magnetic field seem to indicate the presence of a thin, stably stratified layer at the top of the liquid outer core. We present direct numerical simulations of this region, which is modelled as an axisymmetric spherical Couette flow for a stably stratified fluid embedded in a dipolar magnetic field. For strong magnetic fields, a super-rotating shear layer, rotating nearly 30% faster than the imposed rotation rate difference betw…
This work presents numerical results on the transport of heat and chemical species by shear-induced turbulence in strongly stratified but thermally diffusive environments. The shear instabilities driven in this regime are sometimes called "secular" shear instabilities, and can take place even when the gradient Richardson number of the flow (the square of the ratio of the buoyancy frequency to the shearing rate) is large, provided the Péclet number (the ratio of the thermal diffusion timescale to the turnover timescale of the turbulent eddies) is small. We have identified a set of simple criter…
Theoretical studies on linear shear instabilities often use simple velocity and density profiles (e.g. constant, piecewise) for obtaining good qualitative and quantitative predictions of the initial disturbances. Furthermore, such simple profiles provide a minimal model for obtaining a mechanistic understanding of otherwise elusive shear instabilities. However, except a few specific cases, the efficacy of simple profiles has remained limited to the linear stability paradigm. In this work we have proposed a general framework that can simulate the fully nonlinear evolution of a variety of strati…
Turbulent mixing in the radiative regions of stars is usually either ignored or crudely accounted for in most stellar evolution models. However, there is growing theoretical and observational evidence that such mixing is present and can affect various aspects of a star's life. In this work, we present a first attempt at quantifying mixing by horizontal shear instabilities in stars using Direct Numerical Simulations. The shear is driven by a body force, and rapidly becomes unstable. At saturation, we find that several distinct dynamical regimes exist, depending on the relative importance of str…
This work addresses the question of the stability of stratified, spatially periodic shear flows at low Péclet number but high Reynolds number. This little-studied limit is motivated by astrophysical systems, where the Prandtl number is often very small. Furthermore, it can be studied using a reduced set of "low-Péclet-number equations" proposed by Lignieres [Astronomy & Astrophysics, 348, 933-939, 1999]. Through a linear stability analysis, we first determine the conditions for instability to infinitesimal perturbations. We formally extend Squire's theorem to the low-Péclet-number equations, w…
Solid particles can be transported as a mobile granular bed, known as bed-load, by pressure-driven flows. A common case in industry is the presence of bed-load in stratified gas-liquid flows in horizontal ducts. In this case, an initially flat granular bed may be unstable, generating ripples and dunes. This three-phase flow, although complex, can be modeled under some simplifying assumptions. This paper presents a model for the estimation of some bed-load characteristics. Based on parameters easily measurable in industry, the model can predict the local bed-load flow rates and the celerity and…
In this paper, we first revisit the celebrated Boussinesq approximation in stratified flows. Using scaling arguments we show that when the background shear is weak, the Boussinesq approximation yields either (i) $A_t\ll \mathcal{O}(1)$ or (ii) $Fr_c^2 \ll \mathcal{O}(1)$, where $A_t$ is the ratio of density variation to the mean density and $Fr_c$ is the ratio of the phase speed to the long wave speed. The second clause implies, contrary to the commonly accepted notion, that a flow with large density variations can also be Boussinesq. Indeed, we show that deepwater surface gravity waves are Bo…
We study a new type of large-scale instability, which arises in obliquely rotating stratified electroconductive fluid with an external uniform magnetic field and a small-scale external force having zero helicity. This force gives rise to small-scale oscillations of the velocity with a small Reynolds number. Using the method of multi-scale asymptotic expansions there are obtained nonlinear equations for vortex and magnetic perturbations in the third order in Reynolds number. Studied is the linear stage of magneto-vortex dynamo caused by instabilities of $α$-effect type. Stationary solutions for…
Effect of interfacial disturbances on instabilities of buoyant/thermocapillary convective flows in rectangular cavities is studied in a series of numerical experiments. The computations are carried out for several two-liquid two-layer systems taking into account properties of liquids used in previously published experiments. Relation between the interface deformations and the Boussinesq approximation is discussed. It is shown that in some systems, including the interface disturbances in the model can alter the critical temperature difference by approximately 10%, producing either destabilizing…
This article deals with rotating magnetohydrodynamic flows of a thin stratified layer of astrophysical plasma in a gravitational field with a free-surface in a vertical external magnetic field. Magnetohydrodynamic equations are obtained in the two-layer shallow water approximation in an external magnetic field when plasma is divided into two layers of different densities. In the beta-plane approximation a system of shallow water equations for rotating stratified plasma in an external magnetic field is obtained. For stationary initial conditions in the form of vertical or horizontal magnetic fi…
Linear stability of stratified gas-liquid and liquid-liquid plane-parallel flows in inclined channels is studied with respect to all wavenumber perturbations. The main objective is to predict parameter regions in which stable stratified configuration in inclined channels exists. Up to three distinct base states with different holdups exist in inclined flows, so that the stability analysis has to be carried out for each branch separately. Special attention is paid to the multiple solution regions to reveal the feasibility of non-unique stable stratified configurations in inclined channels. The …
Shear-induced turbulence could play a significant role in mixing momentum and chemical species in stellar radiation zones, as discussed by Zahn (1974). In this paper we analyze the results of direct numerical simulations of stratified plane Couette flows, in the limit of rapid thermal diffusion, to measure the turbulent diffusivity and turbulent viscosity as a function of the local shear and the local stratification. We find that the stability criterion proposed by Zahn (1974), namely that the product of the gradient Richardson number and the Prandtl number must be smaller than a critical valu…
This paper continues the systematic investigation of diffusive shear instabilities initiated in Part I of this series. In this work, we primarily focus on quantifying the impact of non-local mixing, which is not taken into account in Zahn's mixing model \citep{Zahn92}. We present the results of direct numerical simulations in a new model setup designed to contain coexisting laminar and turbulent shear layers. As in Part I, we use the Low Péclet Number approximation of \citet{Lign1999} to model the evolution of the perturbations. Our main findings are twofold. First, turbulence is not necessari…
Lakes and many other geophysical flows are shallow, density stratified, and contain a free-surface. Conventional studies on stratified shear instabilities make Boussinesq approximation. Free-surface arising due to large density variations between air and water cannot be taken into consideration under this approximation. Hence the free-surface is usually replaced by a rigid-lid, and therefore has little effect on the stability of the fluid below it. In this paper we have performed non-Boussinesq linear stability analyses of a double circulation velocity profile prevalent in two-layered density …
Motivated by the importance of stratified shear flows in geophysical and environmental circumstances, we characterize their energetics, mixing and spectral behavior through a series of direct numerical simulations of turbulence generated by Holmboe wave instability (HWI) under various initial conditions. We focus on circumstances where the stratification is sufficiently `strong' so that HWI is the dominant primary instability of the flow. Our numerical findings demonstrate the emergence of self-organised criticality (SOC) that is manifest as an adjustment of an appropriately defined gradient R…
Internal gravity waves play a primary role in geophysical fluids: they contribute significantly to mixing in the ocean and they redistribute energy and momentum in the middle atmosphere. Until recently, most studies were focused on plane wave solutions. However, these solutions are not a satisfactory description of most geophysical manifestations of internal gravity waves, and it is now recognized that internal wave beams with a confined profile are ubiquitous in the geophysical context. We will discuss the reason for the ubiquity of wave beams in stratified fluids, related to the fact that th…
Sidewall effects on the onset of interfacial Holmboe waves in stratified exchange flows at high Schmidt number
Univ Toulouse, Toulouse INP, CNRS, IMFT（图卢兹大学，图卢兹国立理工学院，法国国家科学研究中心，流体力学与传热研究所）；Eindhoven University of Technology（埃因霍温理工大学）；Imperial College London（伦敦帝国学院）
We consider turbulence driven by a large-scale horizontal shear in Kolmogorov flow (i.e. with sinusoidal body forcing) and a background linear stable stratification with buoyancy frequency $N_B^2$ imposed in the third, vertical direction in a fluid with kinematic viscosity $ν$. This flow is known to be organised into layers by nonlinear unstable steady states, which incline the background shear in the vertical and can be demonstrated to be the finite-amplitude saturation of a sequence of instabilities, originally from the laminar state. Here, we investigate the next order of motions in this sy…
Many dynamic pipe flow simulator tools are capable of predicting the onset of hydrodynamic flow instability through detailed simulation. These instabilities provide a natural mechanism for flow regime transition. The quality and reliability of flow predictions are however strongly dependent upon the numerics within these simulator tools, the scheme type and resolution in particular. A Kelvin-Helmholtz stability analysis for the differential two-fluid model is in the present work presented and extended to discrete representations of said model. This analysis provides algebraic expressions which…
The `Rayleigh line' $μ=η^2$, where $μ=Ω_o/Ω_i$ and $η=r_i/r_o$ are respectively the rotation and radius ratios between inner (subscript `i') and outer (subscript `o') cylinders, is regarded as marking the limit of centrifugal instability (CI) in unstratified inviscid Taylor-Couette flow, for both axisymmetric and non-axisymmetric modes. Non-axisymmetric stratorotational instability (SRI) is known to set in for anticyclonic rotation ratios beyond that line, i.e. $η^2<μ<1$ for axially stably-stratified Taylor-Couette flow, but the competition between CI and SRI in the range $μ<η^2$ has not yet b…
In planetary fluid cores, the density depends on temperature and chemical composition, which diffuse at very different rates. This leads to various instabilities, bearing the name of double-diffusive convection. We investigate rotating double-diffusive convection (RDDC) in fluid spheres. We use the Boussinesq approximation with homogeneous internal thermal and compositional source terms. We focus on the finger regime, in which the thermal gradient is stabilising whereas the compositional one is destabilising. First, we perform a global linear stability analysis in spheres. The critical Rayleig…
Stably-stratified layers may be present at the top of the electrically-conducting fluid layers of many planets either because the temperature gradient is locally subadiabatic or because a stable composition gradient is maintained by the segregation of chemical elements. Here we study the double-diffusive processes taking place in such a stable layer, considering the case of Mercury's core where the temperature gradient is stable but the composition gradient is unstable over a 800km-thick layer. The large difference in the molecular diffusivities leads to the development of buoyancy-driven inst…
We consider a model of a circular lenticular vortex immersed into a deep and vertically stratified viscous fluid in the presence of gravity and rotation. The vortex is assumed to be baroclinic with a Gaussian profile of angular velocity both in the radial and axial directions. Assuming the base state to be in a cyclogeostrophic balance, we derive linearized equations of motion and seek for their solution in a geometric optics approximation to find amplitude transport equations that yield a comprehensive dispersion relation. Applying algebraic Bilharz criterion to the latter, we establish that …
