The renormalization group in the problem of turbulent convection of a passive scalar impurity with nonlinear diffusion

Abstract

The problem of turbulent mixing of a passive scalar impurity is studied within the renormalization-group approach to the stochastic theory of developed turbulence for the case where the diffusion coefficient is an arbitrary function of the impurity concentration. Such a problem incorporates an infinite number of coupling constants (“charges”). A one-loop calculation shows that in the infinite-dimensional space of the charges there is a two-dimensional surface of fixed points of the renormalization-group equations. When the surface has an IR-stability region, the problem has scaling with universal critical dimensionalities, corresponding to the phenomenological laws of Kolmogorov and Richardson, but with nonuniversal (i.e., depending on the Prandtl number and the explicit form of the nonlinearity in the diffusion equation) scaling functions, amplitude factors in the power laws, and value of the “effective Prandtl turbulence number.”