2023/06/09 by Fabian Binkert, Binkert, Fabian
Engineering · Mathematics · Physics and Astronomy · #Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies #Earth and Planetary Astrophysics (astro-ph.EP) #FOS: Physical sciences #Gas Dynamics and Kinetic Theory #Spacecraft and Cryogenic Technologies
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2306.06103
openalex publication_date 2023/06/09 · openalex created_date 2023/06/13 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01
Turbulence in protoplanetary disks, when present, plays a critical role in transporting dust particles embedded in the gaseous disk component. When using a field description of dust dynamics, a diffusion approach is traditionally used to model this turbulent dust transport. However, it has been shown that classical turbulent diffusion models are not fully self-consistent. Several shortcomings exist, including the ambiguous nature of the diffused quantity and the nonconservation of angular momentum. Orbital effects are also neglected without an explicit prescription. In response to these inconsistencies, we present a novel Eulerian turbulent dust transport model for isotropic and homogeneous turbulence on the basis of a mean-field theory. Our model is based on density-weighted averaging applied to the pressureless fluid equations and uses appropriate turbulence closures. Our model yields novel dynamic equations for the turbulent dust mass flux and recovers existing turbulent transport models in special limiting cases, thus providing a more general and self-consistent description of turbulent particle transport. Importantly, our model ensures the conservation of global angular and linear momentum unconditionally and implicitly accounts for the effects of orbital dynamics in protoplanetary disks. Furthermore, our model correctly describes the vertical settling-diffusion equilibrium solutions for both small and large particles. Hence, this work presents a generalized Eulerian turbulent dust transport model, establishing a comprehensive framework for more detailed studies of turbulent dust transport in protoplanetary disks.