Turbulent flows over porous lattices: alteration of near-wall turbulence and pore-flow amplitude modulation

Abstract

Turbulent flows over porous lattices consisting of rectangular cuboid pores are investigated using scale-resolving direct numerical simulations. Beyond a certain threshold which is primarily determined by the wall-normal Darcy permeability, Ky, near-wall turbulence transitions from its canonical regime, marked by the presence of streak-like structures, to another marked by the presence of Kelvin–Helmholtz-like (K–H-like) spanwise-coherent structures. The threshold agrees well with that previously established in studies where permeable-wall boundary conditions had been used as surrogates for a porous substrate (Gómez-de Segura & García-Mayoral, J. Fluid Mech., vol. 875, 2019, pp. 124–172). In the smooth-wall-like regime, none of the investigated substrates demonstrate any reduction in drag relative to a smooth-wall flow. At the permeable surface, a notable component of the flow is that which adheres to the pore geometry and undergoes modulation by the turbulent scales of motions due to the interaction mechanism described by Abderrahaman-Elena et al. (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 865, 2019, pp. 1042–1071). Its resulting effect can be quantified in terms of an amplitude modulation (AM) using the approach of Mathis et al. (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 628, 2009, pp. 311–337). This pore-coherent flow component persists throughout the porous substrate, highlighting the importance of a given substrate’s microstructure in the presence of an overlying turbulent flow. This geometry-related aspect of the flow is not accounted for when continuum-based models for a porous medium or effective representations of them, such as wall boundary conditions, are used. The intensity of the AM effect is enhanced in the K–H-like regime and becomes strengthened with larger permeability. As a result, structured porous materials may be designed to exploit or mitigate these flow features depending upon the intended application.