Pore pressure in a wind-swept rippled bed below the suspension threshold

Abstract

Toward elucidating how a wavy porous sand bed perturbs a turbulent flow above its surface, we record pressure within a permeable material resembling the region just below desert ripples, contrasting these delicate measurements with earlier studies on similar impermeable surfaces. We run separate tests in a wind tunnel on two sinusoidal porous ripples with aspect ratio of half crest-to-trough amplitude to wavelength of 3% and 6%. For the smaller ratio, pore pressure is a function of streamwise distance with a single delayed harmonic decaying exponentially with depth and proportional to wind speed squared. The resulting pressure on the porous surface is nearly identical to that on a similar impermeable wave. Pore pressure variations at the larger aspect ratio are greater and more complicated. Consistent with the regime map of Kuzan et al. (), the flow separates, creating a depression at crests. Unlike flows on impermeable waves, the porous rippled bed diffuses the depression upstream, reduces surface pressure gradients, and gives rise to a slip velocity, thus affecting the turbulent boundary layer. Pressure gradients within the porous material also generate body forces rising with wind speed squared and ripple aspect ratio, partially counteracting gravity around crests, thereby facilitating the onset of erosion, particularly on ripples of high aspect ratio armored with large surface grains. By establishing how pore pressure gradients scale with ripple aspect ratio and wind speed, our measurements quantify the internal seepage flow that draws dust and humidity beneath the porous surface.