Approximate inertial manifolds and effective viscosity in turbulent flows

Abstract

The recently formulated concept of approximate inertial manifolds is exploited as a means for eliminating systematically the fine structure of the velocity field in two-dimensional flows. The resulting iterative procedure does not invoke any statistical properties of the solutions of Navier–Stokes equations. It leads to a modification of those equations, such that effective viscosity-like terms arise in a natural way. The rigorous mathematical considerations can be related to the corresponding physical concepts and intuition. The result leading to a numerical algorithm, essentially a nonlinear Galerkin method, provides a basis for large eddy simulation in which the subgrid model is derived from the properties of the Navier–Stokes equations, rather than from more or less justifiable ad hoc arguments. Some limited speculations concerning the expected results in three dimensions are also offered.