Scaling and energy transfer in rotating turbulence

¹  Max-Planck-Institut für Plasmaphysik - 85748 Garching, Germany
²  Universität Bayreuth, Theoretische Physik II - 95440 Bayreuth, Germany

Received: 19 July 2006
Accepted: 4 December 2006

Abstract

The inertial-range properties of quasi-stationary hydrodynamic turbulence under solid-body rotation are studied via high-resolution direct numerical simulations. For strong rotation the nonlinear energy cascade exhibits depletion and a pronounced anisotropy with the energy flux proceeding mainly perpendicularly to the rotation axis. This corresponds to a transition towards a quasitwo-dimensional flow similar to a linear Taylor-Proudman state. In contrast to the energy spectrum along the rotation axis which does not scale self-similarly, the perpendicular spectrum displays an inertial range with -behavior. A new phenomenology gives a rationale for the observations. The scaling exponents of structure functions up to order measured perpendicular to the rotation axis indicate reduced intermittency with increasing rotation rate. The proposed phenomenology is consistent with the inferred asymptotic non-intermittent behavior .