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Report presents theoretical study of behavior of evaporating liquid drops entrained in annular cross section of long, coherent gas vortex. Dynamic and thermodynamic interactions described. Study contributes to understanding of evaporation and combustion of sprayed liquid fuels.
A microburst can be modeled by releasing a volume of fluid that is slightly heavier than the ambient fluid, allowing it to fall onto a horizontal surface. Vorticity develops on the sides of this parcel as it descends and causes it to roll up into a turbulent vortex ring which impinges on the ground. Such a model exhibits many of the features of naturally occurring microbursts which are a hazard to aviation. In this paper this model is achieved experimentally by releasing a volume of salt water into fresh water from a cylindrical dispenser. When care is taken with the release the spreading rate of the surface outflow is measurable and quite repeatable despite the fact that the flow is turbulent. An elementary numerical approximation to this model, based on inviscid vortex dynamics, has also been developed. A scaling law is proposed which allows experiments with different fluid densities to be compared with each other and with the numerical results. More importantly the scaling law makes it possible to compare the model results with real microbursts.
Two-dimensional, incompressible, spatially developing mixing layer simulations are performed at Re = 10(exp 2) and 10(exp 4) with two classes of perturbations applied at the inlet boundary; combinations of discrete modes from linear stability theory, and a broad spectrum of modes derived from experimentally measured velocity spectra. The effect of the type and strength of inlet perturbations on vortex dynamics and time-averaged properties are explored. Two-point spatial velocity and autocorrelations are used to estimate the size and lifetime of the resulting coherent structures and to explore possible feedback effects. The computed time-averaged properties such as mean velocity profiles, turbulent statistics, and spread rates show good agreement with experimentally measured values. It is shown that by forcing with a broad spectrum of modes derived from an experimental energy spectrum many experimentally observed phenomena can be reproduced by a 2-D simulation. The strength of the forcing merely affected the length required for the dominant coherent structures to become fully-developed. Thus intensities comparable to those of the background turbulence in many wind tunnel experiments produced the same results, given sufficient simulation length.
Progress in aerodynamics over the past 50 years has been evidenced by the development of increasingly sophisticated and efficient flight vehicles throughout the flight spectrum. Advances have generally arisen in an evolutionary manner from experience gained in wind tunnel testing, flight testing, and improvements in analytical and computational capabilities. As a result of this evolutionary development, both military and commercial vehicles operate at a relatively high efficiency level. This observation plus the fact that airplanes have not changed appreciably in outward appearance over recent years has led some skeptics to conclude incorrectly that aerodynamics is a mature technology, with little to be gained from further developments in the field. It is of interest to note that progress in aerodynamics has occurred without a thorough understanding of the fundamental physics of flow, turbulence, vortex dynamics, and separated flow, for example. The present understanding of transition, turbulence, and boundary layer separation is actually very limited. However, these fundamental flow phenomena provide the key to reducing the viscous drag of aircraft. Drag reduction provides the greatest potential for increased flight efficiency from the standpoint of both saving energy and maximizing performance. Recent advances have led to innovative concepts for reducing turbulent friction drag by modifying the turbulent structure within the boundary layer. Further advances in this basic area should lead to methods for reducing skin friction drag significantly. The current challenges for military aircraft open entirely new fields of investigation for the aerodynamicist. The ability through very high speed information processing technology to totally integrate the flight and propulsion controls can permit an aircraft to fly with "complete abandon," avoiding departure, buffet, and other undesirable characteristics. To utilize these new control concepts, complex aerodynamic phenomena will have to be understood, predicted, and controlled. Current requirements for military aircraft include configuration optimization through a widened envelope from subsonic to supersonic and from low to high angles of attack. This task is further complicated by requirements for control of observables. These challenging new designs do not have the luxury of a large experimental data base from which to optimize for various parameter combinations. Consequently, there exists a strong need for better techniques, both experimental and computational, to permit design optimization in a complete sense.
The two high altitude aircraft, ER-2 NASA #706 and 709 and the DC-8 NASA #717 are in active use in several programs of upper atmospheric research to study polar ozone changes, stratospheric-tropospheric exchange processes and atmospheric effects of aviation aircraft. The ER-2 has participated in seven major missions which mainly concentrated on vortex dynamics and the large losses of Ozone in the Polar regions (Ozone hole) observed in the spring. One mission verified the complex dynamical chemical and physical processes that occur during sunrise and sunset. Stratospheric Tracers of Atmospheric Transport (STRAT) obtained background measurements using the full ER-2 suite of instruments. Photochemistry of Ozone Loss in the Arctic Region in Summer (POLARIS) in 1997 assisted in understanding the mid-latitude and Arctic Ozone losses during the Northern Summer. The DC-8 with the Meteorological Measurement System (MMS) has participated in the Subsonic Aircraft: Cloud and Contrail Effects Special Study (SUCCESS), in 1996 and the Subsonic assessment Ozone and Nitrogen oxide experiment (SONEX) in 1997 missions. The MMS with its sophisticated software accurately measures ground speed and attitude, in-situ static and dynamic pressure total temperature, which are used to calculate the three dimensional wind fields, static pressure, temperature and turbulence values to meteorological accuracy. The meteorological data is not only of interest for its own sake in atmospheric dynamical processes such as mountain waves and flux measurements; but is also required by other ER-2 experiments that simultaneously measure water vapor, O3, aerosols, NO, HCl, CH4, N2O, ClO, BrO, CO2, NOy, HOx and temperature gradients. MMS products are extensively used to assist in the interpretation of their results in understanding the importance of convective effects relative to in-situ chemical changes, as may be noted by examining the list of references attached. The MMS consists of three subsystems: (a) aircraft instrumentation, inertial navigation system (INS), static and dynamic pressure taps, (b) additional dedicated instrumentation measuring angle of attack, yaw, total temperature, and a GPS which on the DC-8 measures position, velocity and attitude (c) an on board data, storage and computing acquisition system. This instrumentation and the associated software requires both an on-going laboratory ground calibration procedure for the total air temperature, static and total pressure inputs, verification of the INS dynamic response and also extensive air measurements and intercomparisons which ultimately verify and calibrate the complete system and its software. More than the usual accuracy is required because of the near cancellation occurring in the difference between the ground speed and true airspeed vectors used to give the wind vector. In the past year we have redesigned, recalibrated and used the MMS system on the NASA DC-8 that was previously used in the SUCCESS mission for the SONEX mission. Two papers were co-authored based on SUCCESS flights. Several reports and handouts were written for SONEX. Calibrations of the DC-8 pressure transducer temperature measuring thermistors was completed and an extensive analysis spanning several years of data files of the DC-8 Rosemount pressure transducer calibrations was done.
In this work we analyze the issue of the formation of condensation trails ("contrails") in the near-field of an aircraft wake. The basic configuration consists in an exhaust engine jet interacting with a wing-tip training vortex. The procedure adopted relies on a mixed Eulerian/Lagrangian two-phase flow approach; a simple micro-physics model for ice growth has been used to couple ice and vapor phases. Large eddy simulations have carried out at a realistic flight Reynolds number to evaluate the effects of turbulent mixing and wake vortex dynamics on ice-growth characteristics and vapor thermodynamic properties.
In the last report we focused on the study of 3D synthetic jets of moderate jet aspect-ratio. Jets in quiescent and cross-flow cases were investigated. Since most of the synthetic jets in practical applications are found to be of large aspect ratio, the focus was shifted to studying synthetic jets of large aspect ratio. In the current year, further progress has been made by studying jets of aspect ratio 8 and infinity. Some other aspects of the jet, like the vorticity flux is looked into apart from analyzing the vortex dynamics, velocity profiles and the other dynamical characteristics of the jet which allows us to extract some insight into the effect of these modifications on the jet performance. Also, efforts were made to qualitatively validate the simulated results with the NASA Langley test cases at higher jet Reynolds number for the quiescent jet case.
Long-term ozone variations at 60-70degS in spring are investigated using ground-based and satellite measurements. Strong positive correlation is shown between year-to-year variations of ozone and temperature in the Antarctic collar region in Septembers and Octobers. Based on this relationship, the effect of year-to-year variations in vortex dynamics has been filtered out. This process results in an ozone time series that shows increasing springtime ozone losses over the Antarctic until the mid-1990s. Since approximately 1997 the ozone losses have leveled off. The analysis confirms that this change is consistent across all instruments and is statistically significant at the 95% confidence level. This analysis quantifies the beginning of the recovery of the ozone hole, which is expected from the leveling off of stratospheric halogen loading due to the ban on CFCs and other halocarbons initiated by the Montreal Protocol.
Polar stratospheric clouds (PSC) play a primary role in the formation of annual ozone holes over Antarctica during the austral sunrise. Meridional temperature gradients in the lower stratosphere and upper troposphere, caused by strong radiative cooling, induce a broad dynamic vortex centered near the South Pole that decouples and insulates the winter polar airmass. PSC nucleate and grow as vortex temperatures gradually fall below equilibrium saturation and frost points for ambient sulfate, nitrate, and water vapor concentrations (generally below 197 K). Cloud surfaces promote heterogeneous reactions that convert stable chlorine and bromine-based molecules into photochemically active ones. As spring nears, and the sun reappears and rises, photolysis decomposes these partitioned compounds into individual halogen atoms that react with and catalytically destroy thousands of ozone molecules before they are stochastically neutralized. Despite a generic understanding of the ozone hole paradigm, many key components of the system, such as cloud occurrence, phase, and composition; particle growth mechanisms; and denitrification of the lower stratosphere have yet to be fully resolved. Satellite-based observations have dramatically improved the ability to detect PSC and quantify seasonal polar chemical partitioning. However, coverage directly over the Antarctic plateau is limited by polar-orbiting tracks that rarely exceed 80 degrees S. In December 1999, a NASA Micropulse Lidar Network instrument (MPLNET) was first deployed to the NOAA Earth Systems Research Laboratory (ESRL) Atmospheric Research Observatory at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station for continuous cloud and aerosol profiling. MPLNET instruments are eye-safe, capable of full-time autonomous operation, and suitably rugged and compact to withstand long-term remote deployment. With only brief interruptions during the winters of 2001 and 2002, a nearly continuous data archive exists to the present.
The following details recent efforts undertaken at the NASA Ames Unitary Plan wind tunnels to design and deploy an advanced, production-level infrared (IR) flow visualization data system. Highly sensitive IR cameras, coupled with in-line image processing, have enabled the visualization of wind tunnel model surface flow features as they develop in real-time. Boundary layer transition, shock impingement, junction flow, vortex dynamics, and buffet are routinely observed in both transonic and supersonic flow regimes all without the need of dedicated ramps in test section total temperature. Successful measurements have been performed on wing-body sting mounted test articles, semi-span floor mounted aircraft models, and sting mounted launch vehicle configurations. The unique requirements of imaging in production wind tunnel testing has led to advancements in the deployment of advanced IR cameras in a harsh test environment, robust data acquisition storage and workflow, real-time image processing algorithms, and evaluation of optimal surface treatments. The addition of a multi-camera IR flow visualization data system to the Ames UPWT has demonstrated itself to be a valuable analyses tool in the study of new and old aircraft/launch vehicle aerodynamics and has provided new insight for the evaluation of computational techniques.
The fluid mechanics of hurricanes strongly depends on boundary layer energetics due to the warm-core nature of the system with peak velocities located at lower levels. One barrier that has inhibited a more complete characterization of energy transfer in the boundary layer is a lack of observations that resolve large, turbulent eddies. In particular, the occurrence and structure of upscale energy transfer (backscatter) in the hurricane boundary layer as well as the effects of backscatter on the vortex intensity are unknown. The analysis presented here of very high-resolution, three-dimensional wind observations from Hurricane Rita (2005) at peak intensity reveals large regions of organized backscatter in the boundary layer associated with coherent, turbulent eddies. Strong forwardscatter is also found next to the backscatter regions due to the interaction between adjacent eddies. Two components of the stress tensor are primarily responsible for this alternating scatter structure, as shown by large correlation coefficients between the fields: the radial–vertical component (τ13) and the azimuthal–vertical component (τ23) with average correlations of 79% and 49 %, respectively. The Leonard, Reynolds and cross-term stress components are also provided. The impact of the sub-filter-scale energy transfer is estimated by computing the kinetic energy budget for the resolved-scale and eddy-scale motions. The results show that the sub-filter-scale energy transfer term is of the same order as the other terms in the eddy-scale budgets, contributing between 16% and 40% to the local time tendency with an average contribution of approximately 30 %. These results indicate that the coherent turbulent eddies can affect the vortex dynamics through wave–wave nonlinear interactions, which can subsequently influence the wave–mean flow interactions. This is the first study to examine the full sub-filter-scale
This paper presents a coupled vortex-lattice flight dynamic model with an aeroelastic finite-element model to predict dynamic characteristics of a flexible wing transport aircraft. The aircraft model is based on NASA Generic Transport Model (GTM) with representative mass and stiffness properties to achieve a wing tip deflection about twice that of a conventional transport aircraft (10% versus 5%). This flexible wing transport aircraft is referred to as an Elastically Shaped Aircraft Concept (ESAC) which is equipped with a Variable Camber Continuous Trailing Edge Flap (VCCTEF) system for active wing shaping control for drag reduction. A vortex-lattice aerodynamic model of the ESAC is developed and is coupled with an aeroelastic finite-element model via an automated geometry modeler. This coupled model is used to compute static and dynamic aeroelastic solutions. The deflection information from the finite-element model and the vortex-lattice model is used to compute unsteady contributions to the aerodynamic force and moment coefficients. A coupled aeroelastic-longitudinal flight dynamic model is developed by coupling the finite-element model with the rigid-body flight dynamic model of the GTM.
Using a contour dynamics method for inviscid axisymmetric flow we examine the effects of core deformation on the dynamics and acoustic signatures of coaxial interacting vortex rings. Both 'passage' and 'collision' (head-on) interactions are studied for initially identical vortices. Good correspondence with experiments is obtained. A simple model which retains only the elliptic degree of freedom in the core shape is used to explain some of the calculated features.
The dynamic responses of a jet-transport aircraft to two types of single-axis wind vortex encounters are studied. Aircraft attitude, flight path angle, and aerodynamic angle excursions are analyzed and dominating dynamic forcing effects are identified for each encounter. A simple departure-preventing LQR controller is designed to demonstrate the benefits of using automatic control to reduce the wind vortex hazard. A Proportional-Integral-Filter controller structure successfully regulates the critical parameters, roll angle, phi, and sideslip angle, beta, for the two different vortex encounters considered in this study.
The contour dynamics method is extended to vortex rings with vorticity varying linearly from the symmetry axis. An elliptic core model is also developed to explain some of the basic physics. Passage and collisions of two identical rings are studied focusing on core deformation, sound generation and stirring of fluid elements. With respect to core deformation, not only the strain rate but how rapidly it varies is important and accounts for greater susceptibility to vortex tearing than in two dimensions. For slow strain, as a passage interaction is completed and the strain relaxes, the cores return to their original shape while permanent deformations remain for rapidly varying strain. For collisions, if the strain changes slowly the core shapes migrate through a known family of two-dimensional steady vortex pairs up to the limiting member of the family. Thereafter energy conservation does not allow the cores to maintain a constant shape. For rapidly varying strain, core deformation is severe and a head-tail structure in good agreement with experiments is formed. With respect to sound generation, good agreement with the measured acoustic signal for colliding rings is obtained and a feature previously thought to be due to viscous effects is shown to be an effect of inviscid core deformation alone. For passage interactions, a component of high frequency is present. Evidence for the importance of this noise source in jet noise spectra is provided. Finally, processes of fluid engulfment and rejection for an unsteady vortex ring are studied using the stable and unstable manifolds. The unstable manifold shows excellent agreement with flow visualization experiments for leapfrogging rings suggesting that it may be a good tool for numerical flow visualization in other time periodic flows.
Compressibility effects on the dynamic stall of a NACA 0012 airfoil undergoing sinusoidal oscillatory motion were studied using a stroboscopic schlieren system. Schlieren pictures and some quantitative data derived from them are presented and show the influence of free-stream Mach number and reduced frequency on the dynamic-stall vortex. This study shows that a dynamic stall vortex always forms near the leading edge and convects on the airfoil upper surface at approximately 0.3 times the free stream velocity for all cases studied. The results also demonstrate that initiation of the dynamic stall vortex is delayed to higher angles of attack with increased reduced frequency, but that dynamic stall occurs at lower angles of incidence with increasing Mach numbers.
The first observations of a vortex street in an atmosphere other than that of the earth are presented, made from a sequence of images of Saturn taken by Voyager 2 in August 1981. The analysis of these images shows that the feature sits at the maximum of the westward jet and suggests that it may be produced by material rising up from below the level of the visible clouds.
The morphology and evolution of the stratospheric ozone (O3) distribution at high latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere (NH) are examined for the late summer and fall seasons of 1999. This time period sets the O3 initial condition for the SOLVE/THESEO field mission performed during winter 1999-2000. In situ and satellite data are used along with a three-dimensional model of chemistry and transport (CTM) to determine the key processes that control the distribution of O3 in the lower-to-middle stratosphere. O3 in the vortex at the beginning of the winter season is found to be nearly constant from 500 to above 800 K with a value at 3 ppmv +/- approx. 10%. Values outside the vortex are up to a factor of 2 higher and increase significantly with potential temperature. The seasonal time series of data from POAM shows that relatively low O3 mixing ratios, which characterize the vortex in late fall, are already present at high latitudes at the end of summer before the vortex circulation sets up. Analysis of the CTM output shows that the minimum O3 and increase in variance in late summer are the result of: 1) stirring of polar concentric O3 gradients by nascent wave-driven transport, and 2) an acceleration of net photochemical loss with decreasing solar illumination. The segregation of low O3 mixing ratios into the vortex as the circulation strengthens through the fall suggests a possible feedback role between O3 chemistry and the vortex formation dynamics. Trajectory calculations from O3 sample points early in the fall, however, show only a weak correlation between initial O3 mixing ratio and potential vorticity later in the season consistent with order-of-magnitude calculations for the relative importance of O3 in the fall radiative balance at high latitudes. The possible connection between O3 chemistry and the dynamics of vortex formation does suggest that these feedbacks and sensitivities need to be better understood in order to make confident predictions of the recovery of NH O3.