Wave Breakdown in Stratified Shear Flows.
Abstract
The wave mechanical condition (Landahl, 1972) for breakdown of an unsteady laminar flow into strong small-scale secondary instabilities is applied to some simple stratified inviscid shear flows. The flows considered have one or two discrete density interfaces and simple discontinuous or continuous velocity profiles. A primary wave-like disturbance of such a flow is observed to produce a perturbation velocity discontinuity at a density interface which leads to local secondary shear-flow instability with a phase and group velocity equal to the mean instantaneous velocity across the interface. The disturbed flow then becomes critical according to the breakdown criterion whenever this velocity reaches a value equal to the phase velocity of the primary wave. Some calculations are discussed.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 1974
- Accession Number
- ADA004482
Entities
People
- M. T. Landahl
- W. O. Criminale Jr.
Organizations
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology