Speaker-wire vortices in stratified anabatic Prandtl slope flows and their secondary instabilities

TL;DR

This paper investigates the formation, stability, and breakdown of speaker-wire vortices in stratified slope flows, revealing their secondary instabilities and role in transition to turbulence through linear stability analysis and numerical simulations.

Contribution

It identifies and analyzes the secondary instabilities of speaker-wire vortices in stratified slope flows, a novel flow structure, linking their dynamics to flow destabilization and turbulence transition.

Findings

Existence of fundamental and subharmonic secondary instabilities.

Subharmonic modes are more dominant, explaining vortex pair stability.

Vortex interactions lead to flow breakdown and turbulence transition.

Abstract

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 breakup. For a fixed slope angle $\alpha=3^{\circ}$ and at a constant Prandtl number, we analyse the saturated state of speaker-wire vortices and perform a bi-global linear stability analysis based on their stationary state. We establish the existence of both fundamental and subharmonic secondary instabilities depending on the circulation and transverse wavelength of the base state of speaker-wire vortices. The dominance of subharmonic modes relative to the fundamental mode helps explain the relative stability of a single vortex pair compared to the vortex dynamics in presence of two or an even number of pairs.These instability modes are essential for the bending and merging of multiple speaker-wire vortices, which break up and lead to more dynamically unstable states, eventually paving the way for transition towards turbulence. This process is demonstrated via direct numerical simulations with which we are able to track the nonlinear temporal evolution of these instabilities.