English

Boundary layers in turbulent Rayleigh-B\'enard convection in air

Fluid Dynamics 2012-09-28 v1

Abstract

The boundary layer flow in a Rayleigh-B\'enard convection cell of rectangular shape has been visualized in this fluid dynamics video. The experiment has been undertaken in air at a Rayleigh number Ra=1.3×1010Ra=1.3\times 10^{10} and a Prandtl number Pr=0.7Pr=0.7. Various sequences captured at selected positions of the heating plate show that the boundary layer is a very transient flow region characterized by coherent structures that permanently evolve. It becomes fully turbulent in the areas where the large-scale circulation impinge or leave the bottom plate.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1209.6201,
  title  = {Boundary layers in turbulent Rayleigh-B\'enard convection in air},
  author = {Ronald du Puits and Johannes Rilk and Christian Resagk and André Thess},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1209.6201},
  year   = {2012}
}

Comments

two pages, one full size video, one reduced size video