On the probability density function model for the transport of particles in anisotropic turbulent flow

Abstract

The purposes of the paper are twofold: (i) to present a rational approach to the modeling of inertial particle transport in anisotropic turbulent flows and (ii) to show how the anisotropy of fluid turbulence timescales affects the particle fluctuating velocities in homogeneous shear flow. For these purposes, the directional dependence of the Lagrangian autocorrelations of fluid velocities is incorporated into the statistical probability density function (PDF) model proposed previously. The anisotropic timescale (ATS) model is evaluated against numerical simulations for homogeneous shear turbulent flows and is compared to results predicted by the isotropic timescale (ITS) model. The new ATS model for the PDF of the particle velocity distribution in turbulent flow appears to yield slightly improved results over the ITS model.