2005/12/31 by Germain Rousseaux, Shahar Seifer, Victor Steinberg +1 · 1 citation
Engineering · Physics and Astronomy · #Characterization and Applications of Magnetic Nanoparticles #Fluid Dynamics and Turbulent Flows #Orbital Angular Momentum in Optics #physics.class-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1007/s00348-006-0238-2
published as Experiments in Fluids 42 (2007) p. 291-299 · 16 pages
arxiv created 2006/06/26 · openalex publication_date 2006/12/29 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
This work is an attempt to test the concept of hydrodynamic charge (analogous to the electric charge in Electromagnetism) in the simple case of a coherent structure such as the Burgers vortex. We provide experimental measurements of both the so-called Lamb vector and its divergence (the charge) by two-dimensional Particle Image Velocimetry. In addition, we perform a Helmholtz-Hodge decomposition of the Lamb vector in order to explore its topological features. We compare the charge with the well-known Q criterion in order to assess its interest in detecting and characterizing coherent structure. Usefulness of this concept in studies of vortex dynamics is demonstrated.