On the existence of two-dimensional nonlinear steady states in plane Couette flow

Abstract

The problem of two-dimensional steady nonlinear dynamics in plane Couette flow is revisited using homotopy from either plane Poiseuille flow or from plane Couette flow perturbed by a small symmetry-preserving identity operator. Our results show that it is not possible to obtain the nonlinear plane Couette flow solutions reported by Cherhabili and Ehrenstein [Eur. J. Mech. B/Fluids 14, 667 (1995)] using their Poiseuille-Couette homotopy. We also demonstrate that the steady solutions obtained by Mehta and Healey [Phys. Fluids 17, 094108 (2005)] for small symmetry-preserving perturbations are influenced by an artefact of the modified system of equations used in their paper. However, using a modified version of their model does not help to find plane Couette flow solution in the limit of vanishing symmetry-preserving perturbations either. The issue of the existence of two-dimensional nonlinear steady states in plane Couette flow remains unsettled.