Point-source inertial particle dispersion

Abstract

The dispersion of inertial particles continuously emitted from a point source is analytically investigated in the limit of small but finite inertia. Our focus is on the evolution equation of the particle joint probability density function p(x, v, t), x and v being the particle position and velocity, respectively. For arbitrary inertia, position and velocity variables are coupled, with the result that p(x, v, t) can be determined by solving a partial differential equation in a 2d-dimensional space, d being the physical-space dimensionality. For small (but nevertheless finite) inertia, (x, v)-variables decouple and the determination of p(x, v, t) is reduced to solve a system of two standard forced advection–diffusion equations in the space variables x. The latter equations are derived here from first principles, i.e., from the well-known Lagrangian evolution equations for position and particle velocity.