O Reynolds Number Dependence of Turbulence Intensities in Free Shear Flows

A model is presented which extends spectral energy cascade theory of turbulence and predicts the Reynolds number dependence of the centerline turbulence intensities in the self-preserving region of several free shear flows at high Re. The model indicates that the Reynolds number needed to achieve the invariance regime is significantly larger than what is commonly assumed, because too few cascade stages exist at lower Reynolds numbers to completely erase the "memory" of large scale initial conditions.