Mukherjee S, Murugan SD, Mukherjee R, Ray SS. Turbulent Flows Are Not Uniformly Multifractal.
PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS 2024;
132:184002. [PMID:
38759159 DOI:
10.1103/physrevlett.132.184002]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/08/2023] [Accepted: 03/04/2024] [Indexed: 05/19/2024]
Abstract
Understanding turbulence rests delicately on the conflict between Kolmogorov's 1941 theory of nonintermittent, space-filling energy dissipation characterized by a unique scaling exponent and the overwhelming evidence to the contrary of intermittency, multiscaling, and multifractality. Strangely, multifractality is not typically envisioned as a local flow property, variations in which might be clues exposing inroads into the fundamental unsolved issues of anomalous dissipation and finite time blowup. We present a simple construction of local multifractality and find that much of the dissipation field remains surprisingly monofractal à la Kolmogorov. Multifractality appears as small islands in this calm sea, its strength growing logarithmically with the local fluctuations in energy dissipation-a seemingly universal feature. These results suggest new ways to understand how singularities could arise and provide a fresh perspective on anomalous dissipation and intermittency. The simplicity and adaptability of our approach also holds great promise in applications ranging from climate sciences to medical data analysis.
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