Richard J.A.M. Stevens

Professor at the University of Twente

Wind energy · Turbulence · Environmental flows

Publication 69 · Thermal convection

What rotation rate maximizes heat transport in rotating Rayleigh-Bénard convection with Prandtl number larger than one?

Y. Yang, R. Verzicco, D. Lohse, R.J.A.M. Stevens, Phys. Rev. Fluids 5, 053501 (2020).

Read the article Open-access version (university repository)

Main finding

The rotation rate giving maximum heat transport falls into two regimes in the simulated convection, with a supported scaling at low Rayleigh number. The high-Rayleigh-number mechanism and transfer beyond the tested matrix remain provisional.

Optimal rotation rate against Rayleigh number for several geometries and Prandtl numbers
How to read the figure. (a) The rotation rate giving maximum heat transport, against Rayleigh number, for periodic and cylindrical cells; a vertical line marks where the behaviour changes, and the lower-Rayleigh points follow a fitted power law. (b) The same across Prandtl numbers from 4.38 to 100, with parallel fits. Open the full-resolution figure. Figure 4. Y. Yang et al. (2020). No separate licence is stated here; consult the original publication and credited source before reuse.

Why this matters

Moderate rotation has an optimum, and that optimum changes when turbulence disrupts coherent vortices.

Research context

Earlier work establishes the rotation-induced transition and the Prandtl-number optimum. This paper maps the optimal rotation rate across Rayleigh number; later confinement studies add a second control parameter, while large-Rayleigh-number analysis extends the dataset to test how the optimum changes regime.

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