Small-scale entrainment in inclined gravity currents

Abstract

We investigate the effect of buoyancy on the small-scale aspects of turbulent entrainment by performing direct numerical simulation of a gravity current and a wall jet. In both flows, we detect the turbulent/nonturbulent interface separating turbulent from irrotational ambient flow regions using a range of enstrophy iso-levels spanning many orders of magnitude. Conform to expectation, the relative enstrophy isosurface velocity vn in the viscous superlayer scales with the Kolmogorov velocity for both flow cases. We connect the integral entrainment coefficient E to the small-scale entrainment and observe excellent agreement between the two estimates throughout the viscous superlayer. The contribution of baroclinic torque to vn is negligible, and we show that the primary reason for reduced entrainment in the gravity current as compared to the wall-jet are 1) the reduction of vn relative to the integral velocity scale uT; and 2) the reduction in the surface area of the isosurfaces.