Characteristics of turbulent coherent structures in atmospheric flow under different shear-buoyancy conditions

Turbulent coherent structures in the atmospheric boundary layer exert unsteady loads on mechanical and civil structures and greatly contribute to pollutant dispersion and heat dissipation. Much has been deduced about the characteristics of these structures at the laboratory scale in pure shear-drive...

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Main Authors: Lotfy, Eslam R., Abbas, Ashraf A., Zaki, Sheikh Ahmad, Harun, Zambri
Format: Article
Published: Springer Netherlands 2019
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Online Access:http://eprints.utm.my/id/eprint/87918/
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10546-019-00459-y
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spelling my.utm.879182020-11-30T13:37:03Z http://eprints.utm.my/id/eprint/87918/ Characteristics of turbulent coherent structures in atmospheric flow under different shear-buoyancy conditions Lotfy, Eslam R. Abbas, Ashraf A. Zaki, Sheikh Ahmad Harun, Zambri TA Engineering (General). Civil engineering (General) Turbulent coherent structures in the atmospheric boundary layer exert unsteady loads on mechanical and civil structures and greatly contribute to pollutant dispersion and heat dissipation. Much has been deduced about the characteristics of these structures at the laboratory scale in pure shear-driven flows. We examine the influence of atmospheric stability (shear–buoyancy variation) on the newly discovered properties of these turbulence features using observations obtained from a test facility at an onshore site on the east coast of Malaysia. Three ultrasonic anemometers placed at 1.7, 3 and 12 m above ground collected 124 30-min samples of the undisturbed flow. Contrary to expectations, the decline in shear stress in stable stratification reduced the time delay of the peak cross-correlation, implying an increase in the inclination angle of these structures. A wavelet analysis shows that, although the time scale of the vortex packets decreases as the atmosphere becomes increasingly stable, the super-streak time scale increases. The monotonic increase in the energy content in the convective direction results in an enhanced modulating effect for the large super-streaks on the small vortex packets. Analyzing the structure coherence defined as the temporal extension of the streamwise velocity depression reveals two stages of the life cycle of convective rolls. In the first stage, a super-streak couple consisting of a warm updraft and a cold downdraft appears simultaneously at a Monin–Obukhov stability parameter ζ=-3.5. In the second stage, the warm updraft strengthens and the cold downdraft weakens. Springer Netherlands 2019-10-01 Article PeerReviewed Lotfy, Eslam R. and Abbas, Ashraf A. and Zaki, Sheikh Ahmad and Harun, Zambri (2019) Characteristics of turbulent coherent structures in atmospheric flow under different shear-buoyancy conditions. Boundary-Layer Meteorology, 173 (1). pp. 115-141. ISSN 0006-8314 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10546-019-00459-y DOI:10.1007/s10546-019-00459-y
institution Universiti Teknologi Malaysia
building UTM Library
collection Institutional Repository
continent Asia
country Malaysia
content_provider Universiti Teknologi Malaysia
content_source UTM Institutional Repository
url_provider http://eprints.utm.my/
topic TA Engineering (General). Civil engineering (General)
spellingShingle TA Engineering (General). Civil engineering (General)
Lotfy, Eslam R.
Abbas, Ashraf A.
Zaki, Sheikh Ahmad
Harun, Zambri
Characteristics of turbulent coherent structures in atmospheric flow under different shear-buoyancy conditions
description Turbulent coherent structures in the atmospheric boundary layer exert unsteady loads on mechanical and civil structures and greatly contribute to pollutant dispersion and heat dissipation. Much has been deduced about the characteristics of these structures at the laboratory scale in pure shear-driven flows. We examine the influence of atmospheric stability (shear–buoyancy variation) on the newly discovered properties of these turbulence features using observations obtained from a test facility at an onshore site on the east coast of Malaysia. Three ultrasonic anemometers placed at 1.7, 3 and 12 m above ground collected 124 30-min samples of the undisturbed flow. Contrary to expectations, the decline in shear stress in stable stratification reduced the time delay of the peak cross-correlation, implying an increase in the inclination angle of these structures. A wavelet analysis shows that, although the time scale of the vortex packets decreases as the atmosphere becomes increasingly stable, the super-streak time scale increases. The monotonic increase in the energy content in the convective direction results in an enhanced modulating effect for the large super-streaks on the small vortex packets. Analyzing the structure coherence defined as the temporal extension of the streamwise velocity depression reveals two stages of the life cycle of convective rolls. In the first stage, a super-streak couple consisting of a warm updraft and a cold downdraft appears simultaneously at a Monin–Obukhov stability parameter ζ=-3.5. In the second stage, the warm updraft strengthens and the cold downdraft weakens.
format Article
author Lotfy, Eslam R.
Abbas, Ashraf A.
Zaki, Sheikh Ahmad
Harun, Zambri
author_facet Lotfy, Eslam R.
Abbas, Ashraf A.
Zaki, Sheikh Ahmad
Harun, Zambri
author_sort Lotfy, Eslam R.
title Characteristics of turbulent coherent structures in atmospheric flow under different shear-buoyancy conditions
title_short Characteristics of turbulent coherent structures in atmospheric flow under different shear-buoyancy conditions
title_full Characteristics of turbulent coherent structures in atmospheric flow under different shear-buoyancy conditions
title_fullStr Characteristics of turbulent coherent structures in atmospheric flow under different shear-buoyancy conditions
title_full_unstemmed Characteristics of turbulent coherent structures in atmospheric flow under different shear-buoyancy conditions
title_sort characteristics of turbulent coherent structures in atmospheric flow under different shear-buoyancy conditions
publisher Springer Netherlands
publishDate 2019
url http://eprints.utm.my/id/eprint/87918/
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10546-019-00459-y
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score 13.211869