George Haller

Distinguished material surfaces and coherent structures in three-dimensional fluid flows

We prove analytic criteria for the existence of finite-time attracting and repelling material surfaces and lines in three-dimensional unsteady flows. The longest lived such structures define coherent structures in a Lagrangian sense. Our existence criteria involve the invariants of the velocity gradient tensor along fluid trajectories. An alternative approach to coherent structures is shown to lead to their characterization as local maximizers of the largest finite-time Lyapunov exponent field computed directly from particle paths. Both approaches provide effective tools for extracting distinguished Lagrangian structures from three-dimensional velocity data. We illustrate the results on steady and unsteady ABC-type flows.

Lagrangian coherent structures and mixing in two-dimensional turbulence

Abstract We introduce a Lagrangian definition for the boundaries of coherent structures in two-dimensional turbulence. The boundaries are defined as material lines that are linearly stable or unstable for longer times than any of their neighbors. Such material lines are responsible for stretching and folding in the mixing of passive tracers. We derive an analytic criterion that can be used to extract coherent structures with high precision from numerical or experimental data sets. The criterion provides a rigorous link between the Lagrangian concept of hyperbolicity, the Okubo–Weiss criterion, and vortex boundaries. We apply the results to simulations of two-dimensional barotropic turbulence.

An objective definition of a vortex

The most widely used definitions of a vortex are not objective: they identify different structures as vortices in frames that rotate relative to each other. Yet a frame-independent vortex definition is essential for rotating flows and for flows with interacting vortices. Here we define a vortex as a set of fluid trajectories along which the strain acceleration tensor is indefinite over directions of zero strain. Physically, this objective criterion identifies vortices as material tubes in which material elements do not align with directions suggested by the strain eigenvectors. We show using examples how this vortex criterion outperforms earlier frame-dependent criteria. As a side result, we also obtain an objective criterion for hyperbolic Lagrangian structures.

Lagrangian coherent structures from approximate velocity data

This paper examines whether hyperbolic Lagrangian structures—such as stable and unstable manifolds—found in model velocity data represent reliable predictions for mixing in the true fluid velocity field. The error between the model and the true velocity field may result from velocity interpolation, extrapolation, measurement imprecisions, or any other deterministic source. We find that even large velocity errors lead to reliable predictions on Lagrangian coherent structures, as long as the errors remain small in a special time-weighted norm. More specifically, we show how model predictions from the Okubo–Weiss criterion or from finite-time Lyapunov exponents can be validated. We also estimate how close the true Lagrangian coherent structures are to those predicted by models.

Finding finite-time invariant manifolds in two-dimensional velocity fields

For two-dimensional velocity fields defined on finite time intervals, we derive an analytic condition that can be used to determine numerically the location of uniformly hyperbolic trajectories. The conditions of our main theorem will be satisfied for typical velocity fields in fluid dynamics where the deformation rate of coherent structures is slower than individual particle speeds. We also propose and test a simple numerical algorithm that isolates uniformly finite-time hyperbolic sets in such velocity fields. Uniformly hyperbolic sets serve as the key building blocks of Lagrangian mixing geometry in applications. (c) 2000 American Institute of Physics.

Detection of Lagrangian coherent structures in three-dimensional turbulence

We use direct Lyapunov exponents (DLE) to identify Lagrangian coherent structures in two different three-dimensional flows, including a single isolated hairpin vortex, and a fully developed turbulent flow. These results are compared with commonly used Eulerian criteria for coherent vortices. We find that, despite additional computational cost, the DLE method has several advantages over Eulerian methods, including greater detail and the ability to define structure boundaries without relying on a preselected threshold. As a further advantage, the DLE method requires no velocity derivatives, which are often too noisy to be useful in the study of a turbulent flow. We study the evolution of a single hairpin vortex into a packet of similar structures, and show that the birth of a secondary vortex corresponds to a loss of hyperbolicity of the Lagrangian coherent structures.

Finite time transport in aperiodic flows

Abstract We study the transport of particles in a general, two-dimensional, incompressible flow in the presence of a transient eddy, i.e., a bounded set of closed streamlines with a finite time of existence. Using quantities obtained from Eulerian observations, we provide explicit conditions for the existence of a hyperbolic structure in the flow, which induces mixing between the eddy and its environment. Our results can be used directly to study finite-time transport in numerically or experimentally generated vector fields with general time-dependence.

Lagrangian structures and the rate of strain in a partition of two-dimensional turbulence

We derive analytic criteria for the existence of hyperbolic (attracting or repelling), elliptic, and parabolic material lines in two-dimensional turbulence. The criteria use a frame-independent Eulerian partition of the physical space that is based on the sign definiteness of the strain acceleration tensor over directions of zero strain. For Navier–Stokes flows, our hyperbolicity criterion can be reformulated in terms of strain, vorticity, pressure, viscous and body forces. The special material lines we identify allow us to locate different kinds of material structures that enhance or suppress finite-time turbulent mixing: stretching and folding lines, Lagrangian vortex cores, and shear jets. We illustrate the use of our criteria on simulations of two-dimensional barotropic turbulence.

Experimental Measurements of Stretching Fields in Fluid Mixing

The mixing of an impurity into a flowing fluid is an important process in many areas of science, including geophysical processes, chemical reactors, and microfluidic devices. In some cases, for example periodic flows, the concepts of nonlinear dynamics provide a deep theoretical basis for understanding mixing. Unfortunately, the building blocks of this theory, i.e. the fixed points and invariant manifolds of the associated Poincare map, have remained inaccessible to direct experimental study, thus limiting the insight that could be obtained. Using precision measurements of tracer particle trajectories in a two-dimensional fluid flow producing chaotic mixing, we directly measure the time-dependent stretching and compression fields. These quantities, previously available only numerically, attain local maxima along lines coinciding with the stable and unstable manifolds, thus revealing the dynamical structures that control mixing. Contours or level sets of a passive impurity field are found to be aligned parallel to the lines of large compression (unstable manifolds) at each instant. This connection appears to persist as the onset of turbulence is approached.

Coherent Lagrangian vortices: The black holes of turbulence

We introduce a simple variational principle for coherent material vortices in two-dimensional turbulence. Vortex boundaries are sought as closed stationary curves of the averaged Lagrangian strain. Solutions to this problem turn out to be mathematically equivalent to photon spheres around black holes in cosmology. The fluidic photon spheres satisfy explicit differential equations whose outermost limit cycles are optimal Lagrangian vortex boundaries. As an application, we uncover super-coherent material eddies in the South Atlantic, which yield specific Lagrangian transport estimates for Agulhas rings.