Koeli Ghoshal

Turbulence statistics of flow over isolated scalene and isosceles triangular-shaped bedforms

The objective of this research is to examine the turbulent flow characteristics over artificial waveform structures and to compare turbulence between two types of isolated geometries. Measurement of turbulent velocity components have been performed over the respective structures of equal crest height and length at the Fluvial Mechanics Laboratory (FML) of the Indian Statistical Institute, Calcutta. The velocity data were analyzed to determine the relative importance of mean flows, Reynolds stresses and the contributions of burst-sweep cycles. The difference in the sizes of the separation zone for these two cases makes significant differences in the mean flow and turbulence. The motivation of this study is to identify the spatial changes of flow and turbulent events over these structures, and to gain better insight in the flow physics, which are different conditions for the process of sediment transport.

Influence of bed roughness on sediment suspension: experimental and theoretical studies

Flume experiments with five beds of heterogeneous sediment mixtures having different values of bed roughness show that for fixed height and velocity the amount of suspension concentration increases up to a certain value with increase of bed roughness and then decreases with further increase of bed roughness. This indicates depletion of concentration in suspension due to increase of coarse sediment in the bed. Some sort of “critical bed roughness” together with sediment entrapment acting on the sediment beds due to further increase of bed roughness prevent grain sizes from lifting into suspension from the beds. Mathematical models for computation of actual amount (g/l) and size distribution of suspended materials over different sediment beds, based on Hunts diffusion equations for sediments and water, have been developed in this work. Models give results which compare well with the observed values of actual amount and grain-size distributions comprising the wide range of grain sizes. In this study, the parameter γ, the ratio of sediment diffusion coefficient to the momentum diffusion coefficient, has been shown to be a function of normalized settling velocity of particle, and the relation has been used to estimate sediment suspension distribution.

One-Dimensional velocity distribution in open channels using Renyi entropy

In this work, the concept of entropy based on probability is applied in modeling the vertical distribution of velocity in open channel turbulent flow. Using the principle of maximum entropy, one-dimensional velocity distribution is derived by maximizing the Renyi entropy subject to some constraints by assuming dimensionless velocity as a random variable. The Renyi entropy-based equation is capable of modeling the velocity distribution from the channel bed to the water surface. The derived velocity distribution is tested with field and laboratory observations and is also compared with existing entropy-based velocity distributions. The present model has shown good agreement with observed data and its prediction accuracy is superior than the other existing models.

Grain-size distribution in suspension over a sand-gravel bed in open channel flow

Abstract Grain-size distributions of suspended load over a sand-gravel bed at two different flow velocities were studied in a laboratory flume. The experiments had been performed to study the influence of flow velocity and suspension height on grain-size distribution in suspension over a sand-gravel bed. The experimental findings show that with an increase of flow velocity, the grain-size distribution of suspended load changed from a skewed form to a bimodal one at higher suspension heights. This study focuses on the determination of the parameter β n which is the ratio of the sediment diffusion coefficient to the momentum diffusion coefficient of n th grain-size. A new relationship has been proposed involving β n , the normalizing settling velocity of sediment particles and suspension height, which is applicable for widest range of normalizing settling velocity available in literature so far. A similar parameter β for calculating total suspension concentration is also developed. The classical Rouse equation is modified with β n and β and used to compute grain-size distribution and total concentration in suspension, respectively. The computed values have shown good agreement with the measured values of experimental data.

Effects of secondary current and stratification on suspension concentration in an open channel flow

In this work, a mathematical model on concentration distribution is developed for a steady, uniform open channel turbulent flow laden with sediments by incorporating the effect of secondary current through velocity distribution together with the stratification effect due to presence of sediments. The effect of particle-particle interaction at reference level and the effect of incipient motion probability, non-ceasing probability and pick-up probability of the sediment particles at reference concentration are taken into account. The proposed model is compared with the Rouse equation as well as verified with existing experimental data. Good agreement between computed value and experimental data indicates that secondary current influences the suspension of particles significantly. The direction and magnitude (strength) of secondary current lead to different patterns of concentration distribution and theoretical analysis shows that type II profile (where maximum concentration appears at significant height above channel bed surface) always corresponds to upward direction and greater magnitude of secondary current.

Influence of secondary current on vertical concentration distribution in an open channel flow

Considering the effect of secondary current for a steady turbulent flow through straight rectangular open channels, analytical models for suspended sediment concentration distribution are derived from two-phase flow analysis. The proposed models significantly improve the Rouse equation and show that secondary currents have considerable effect on sediment concentration distribution. Finally, models are verified with the experimental data available in the literature, and a good agreement has been achieved between the calculated values and observed data.

Turbulence, suspension and downstream fining over a sand-gravel mixture bed

Abstract Flume experiments were carried out to study the turbulence and its impact on suspension and segregation of grain-sizes under unidirectional flow conditions over the sand-gravel mixture bed. The components of fluid velocity with fluctuations were measured vertically using 3-D Micro-acoustic Doppler velocimeter (ADV). The theoretical models for velocity and sediment suspension have been developed based on the concept of mixing length that includes the damping effect of turbulence due to sediment suspension in the flow over the sand-gravel mixture bed. Statistical analysis of segregation of grain-sizes along downstream of the bed has been performed using the principle of unsupervised learning or clustering problem. Exploratory data analysis suggests that there is a progressive downstream fining of sediment sizes with selective depositions of gravels, sand-gravels and sand materials along the stream, which may be segmented into three regions such as, the upstream, the transitional and the downstream respectively. This contribution is relevant to understand the direction of ancient rivers, the bed material character in the river form, sorting process and its role in controlling the sediment flux through landscape.

Entropy-Based Modeling of Velocity Lag in Sediment-Laden Open Channel Turbulent Flow

In the last few decades, a wide variety of instruments with laser-based techniques have been developed that enable experimentally measuring particle velocity and fluid velocity separately in particle-laden flow. Experiments have revealed that stream-wise particle velocity is different from fluid velocity, and this velocity difference is commonly known as “velocity lag” in the literature. A number of experimental, as well as theoretical investigations have been carried out to formulate deterministic mathematical models of velocity lag, based on several turbulent features. However, a probabilistic study of velocity lag does not seem to have been reported, to the best of our knowledge. The present study therefore focuses on the modeling of velocity lag in open channel turbulent flow laden with sediment using the entropy theory along with a hypothesis on the cumulative distribution function. This function contains a parameter η, which is shown to be a function of specific gravity, particle diameter and shear velocity. The velocity lag model is tested using a wide range of twenty-two experimental runs collected from the literature and is also compared with other models of velocity lag. Then, an error analysis is performed to further evaluate the prediction accuracy of the proposed model, especially in comparison to other models. The model is also able to explain the physical characteristics of velocity lag caused by the interaction between the particles and the fluid.

Vertical distribution of fluid velocity and suspended sediment in open channel turbulent flow

To predict the vertical distribution of streamwise fluid velocity and suspended sediment concentration profiles in an open channel turbulent flow, we derive a theoretical model here based on the Reynolds averaged Navier–Stokes equation and the mass conservation equations of solid and fluid phases. The model includes the effects of secondary current in terms of the vertical velocity of fluid, additional vertical velocity of fluid due to the suspended particles, mixing length of sediment-laden flow and settlement of the suspended particles due to gravitational force. We numerically solve our model as coupled differential equations and the obtained solution agrees well with a wide spectrum of experimental data. A detailed error analysis asserts the superior determination accuracy of our model in comparison to the traditional log-law and Rouse equation and other existing theoretical models. The significance of the turbulent features included in the model and the importance of their co-existence to compute velocity and concentration profiles are explained. In sharp contrast to the previous researchers, the present model has significant contribution in unveiling several latent phenomena of particle-turbulence interaction throughout the flow region. The model can also address various crucial phenomena of velocity and concentration profiles that occur during flow in real situation.

Effect of particle concentration on sediment and turbulent diffusion coefficients in open-channel turbulent flow

To achieve a complete knowledge about the effect of particle concentration on sediment and turbulent diffusion coefficients in open-channel turbulent flow is a long-standing problem for the community of researchers. The effect of particle concentration is investigated on the sediment and turbulent diffusion coefficients through the inverse of turbulent Schmidt number or β which is defined by the ratio of sediment diffusion coefficient to turbulent diffusion coefficient. It is observed that with increasing particle concentration, the sediment diffusion coefficient decreases more in comparison with the turbulent diffusion coefficient for both dilute and non-dilute sediment-laden flows. The physical characteristics of β observed are expressed mathematically in terms of normalized settling velocity, reference level and reference concentration. The applicability of the mathematical formulae is confirmed by the agreement analysis between experimental data and particle concentration profile computed from the Rouse equations modified through the newly proposed expression of β. Apart from the better agreement between dilute particle concentration data and the developed Rouse equation, the striking observation is that the modified Rouse equation shows reasonable computational accuracy for non-dilute particle concentration data also. Minimum error is obtained from the present model when it is compared with the models proposed by the previous researchers.