The Effect of Initial Perturbations on the Development of Rayleigh-Taylor Mixing
Abstract
A statistically steady three-dimensional experiment to study Rayleigh-Taylor mixing at small Atwood number, typical of environmental applications, is described. Long data collection times are possible and have been used to form ensemble averages. By marking one of the fluids with a dye, photographic image analysis has been used to obtain ensemble averaged mix widths. Single and binary initial perturbations have been used to investigate the development of Rayleigh-Taylor mixing. The results indicate a clear transition from an initial linear growth rate of the mixing region to a non-linear quadratic growth rate. Previously when starting the experiment from a random set of small perturbations the quadratic growth rate constant, α, has been measured at 0.07. When initial conditions are carefully specified short wavelength initial perturbations still give α 0.07, but at longer wavelengths the transition to quadratic growth has not taken place and the correspondin! g α 0.15. This precursor
- Publication:
-
APS Division of Fluid Dynamics Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- November 1996
- Bibcode:
- 1996APS..DFD..HC01A