Numerical Study on Randomization in Late Boundary Layer Transition

TL;DR

This study uses high-order DNS to investigate the internal mechanisms behind flow randomization in late boundary layer transition, emphasizing the role of internal ring structure instability over external noise.

Contribution

It reveals that internal symmetry loss in multi-level ring structures, rather than background noise, primarily causes flow randomization during boundary layer transition.

Findings

Loss of symmetry begins at middle level rings.

Internal ring structure instability triggers flow randomization.

Background noise is not the main cause of turbulence onset.

Abstract

The mechanism of randomization in late boundary layer transition is a key issue of late boundary layer transition and turbulence theory. We studied the mechanism carefully by high order DNS. The randomization was originally considered as a result of large background noise and non-periodic spanwise boundary conditions. It was addressed that the large ring structure is affected by background noises first and then the change of large ring structure affects the small length scale quickly, which directly leads to randomization and formation of turbulence. However, what we observed is that the loss of symmetry starts from the middle level rings while the top and bottom rings are still symmetric. The nonsymmetric structure of second level rings will influence the small length scales at the boundary layer bottom quickly. The symmetry loss at the bottom of the boundary layer is quickly spread to up level through ejections. This will lead to randomization of the whole flow field. Therefore, the internal instability of multiple level ring structure, especially the middle ring cycles, is the main reason for flow randomization, but not the background noise. A hypothesis is given that the loss of symmetry may be caused by the shift from C-type transition to K-type transition or reverses.