A hybrid Lagrangian–Eulerian particle‐level set method for numerical simulations of two‐fluid turbulent flows

A coupled Lagrangian interface‐tracking and Eulerian level set (LS) method is developed and implemented for numerical simulations of two‐fluid flows. In this method, the interface is identified based on the locations of notional particles and the geometrical information concerning the interface and fluid properties, such as density and viscosity, are obtained from the LS function. The LS function maintains a signed distance function without an auxiliary equation via the particle‐based Lagrangian re‐initialization technique. To assess the new hybrid method, numerical simulations of several ‘standard interface‐moving’ problems and two‐fluid laminar and turbulent flows are conducted. The numerical results are evaluated by monitoring the mass conservation, the turbulence energy spectral density function and the consistency between Eulerian and Lagrangian components. The results of our analysis indicate that the hybrid particle‐level set method can handle interfaces with complex shape change, and can accurately predict the interface values without any significant (unphysical) mass loss or gain, even in a turbulent flow. The results obtained for isotropic turbulence by the new particle‐level set method are validated by comparison with those obtained by the ‘zero Mach number’, variable‐density method. For the cases with small thermal/mass diffusivity, both methods are found to generate similar results. Analysis of the vorticity and energy equations indicates that the destabilization effect of turbulence and the stability effect of surface tension on the interface motion are strongly dependent on the density and viscosity ratios of the fluids. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Assessment of ghost-cell based cut-cell method for large-eddy simulations of compressible flows at high Reynolds number

Large-eddy simulations (LES) of high Reynolds number flows are performed using a non-body conformal method in conjunction with a wall model. We use a simple wall function to model the wall-shear stress and the truncation error of the numerical discretization to model the sub-grid scale turbulence (implicit LES), although these can be easily replaced if necessary. The validation cases are: turbulent flow through an inclined channel, turbulent flow over a wavy surface, and supersonic flow over a circular cylinder. Since the near-wall grids are naturally coarse, the key is to use a method that is capable of capturing the flow dynamics accurately in the vicinity of the interface. Towards the purpose, we develop a Cartesian cut-cell method, referred to as the ghost-cell based cut-cell method (GC-CCM), in the context of fully compressible solutions of Navier–Stokes equations. This method employs ghost-cells inside the solid interface such that the local spatial reconstruction remains consistent everywhere including in the vicinity of the boundary. In order to capture the near-wall flow behavior more accurately with coarse grids, this method decomposes cell faces of merged cells and computes fluxes through each decomposed segment separately. The objective of this work is to qualify whether the proposed method can accurately represent the high Reynolds number flows in the vicinity of immersed interfaces. To analyze the performance of the proposed method, we compare the results to the corresponding numerical results from the two other non-body conformal methods, namely the ghost-cell based immersed boundary method (GCIBM) and standard cut-cell method (S-CCM), that are implemented in the same numerical solver. The comparison demonstrates that the proposed method is capable of capturing near-wall flows relatively accurately with coarse grids.     

A PLIC volume tracking method for the simulation of two‐fluid flows

Numerical methodologies for computer simulations of two‐fluid flows are presented. These methodologies fall into the category of volume tracking methods with piecewise‐linear interface calculation (PLIC). The scope of this work is limited to laminar flows of immiscible, non‐reacting, incompressible Newtonian fluids, without phase change, in planar two‐dimensional geometries. The following novel or enhanced procedures are proposed: a parallelogram scheme for multidimensional advection of the volume‐fraction field; a circle‐fit technique for the orientation of the interface segments and the calculation of curvature; a novel contact angle treatment; and a staggered formulation for volumetric body forces that can accurately balance pressure forces in the vicinity of the interface. In addition, surface‐tension‐derived and hydrostatic‐derived pressure adjustments are introduced as a means of accurately calculating pressure forces in cells that contain the interface, so as to minimize the non‐physical flows that afflict many available volume tracking methods. The proposed method is validated using four test problems that involve simulations of pure advection, a static drop, an oscillating bubble, and a static meniscus. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A dual‐time central difference finite volume scheme for interface capturing on unstructured meshes

This paper describes a central difference scheme for the prediction of flows with an interface. The interface is captured rather than tracked and the key to the current approach is a correction to the hydrostatic pressure. The correction enables the scheme to evaluate pressures at cell faces in a consistent manner so that the source term in the equations is correctly balanced at the interface and on non‐equispaced meshes. This prevents the development of large errors in the solution, which can lead to the divergence of the numerical scheme. The current approach allows interface flows to be calculated by a simple modification of existing central difference codes. Results for a number of test cases are presented, with comparisons made with both experimental data and other numerical solutions. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Development of level set method with good area preservation to predict interface in two‐phase flows

A two‐step conservative level set method is proposed in this study to simulate the gas/water two‐phase flow. For the sake of accuracy, the spatial derivative terms in the equations of motion for an incompressible fluid flow are approximated by the coupled compact scheme. For accurately predicting the modified level set function, the dispersion‐relation‐preserving advection scheme is developed to preserve the theoretical dispersion relation for the first‐order derivative terms shown in the pure advection equation cast in conservative form. For the purpose of retaining its long‐time accurate Casimir functionals and Hamiltonian in the transport equation for the level set function, the time derivative term is discretized by the sixth‐order accurate symplectic Runge–Kutta scheme. To resolve contact discontinuity oscillations near interface, nonlinear compression flux term and artificial damping term are properly added to the second‐step equation of the modified level set method. For the verification of the proposed dispersion‐relation‐preserving scheme applied in non‐staggered grids for solving the incompressible flow equations, three benchmark problems have been chosen in this study. The conservative level set method with area‐preserving property proposed for capturing the interface in incompressible fluid flows is also verified by solving the dam‐break, Rayleigh–Taylor instability, bubble rising in water, and droplet falling in water problems. Good agreements with the referenced solutions are demonstrated in all the investigated problems. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An interface damage model accounting for in-plane effects

The present work deals with the formulation of a kinematic enriched model for cohesive interface. In fact, the interface kinematics is defined by the relative displacement occurring between the two surfaces of the interface and, even, by the strain arising in the plane of the interface. A damage model which accounts for the mode I and mode II and for the axial deformation of the interface is proposed starting from the Drucker–Prager failure criterion. A numerical procedure is developed implementing the proposed interface model into a new finite element. The nonlinear evolutive problem is solved adopting a predictor–corrector technique within the backward time integration scheme. Simple numerical simulations are presented in order to assess the features of the model. Moreover, numerical applications are carried out in order to demonstrate the ability of the proposed model in reproducing the mechanical behavior of the cohesive elements strengthened with external FRP reinforcements. Comparisons between available experimental data and numerical results obtained using the proposed model show the effectiveness of the presented formulation.     

Simulation of incompressible multiphase flows with complex geometry using etching multiblock method

The incompressible two-phase flows are simulated using combination of an etching multiblock method and a diffuse interface (DI) model, particularly in the complex domain that can be decomposed into multiple rectangular subdomains. The etching multiblock method allows natural communications between the connected subdomains and the efficient parallel computation. The DI model can consider two-phase flows with a large density ratio, and simulate the flows with the moving contact line (MCL) when a geometric formulation of the MCL model is included. Therefore, combination of the etching method and the DI model has potential to deal with a variety of two-phase flows in industrial applications. The performance is examined through a series of numerical experiments. The convergence of the etching method is firstly tested by simulating single-phase flows past a square cylinder, and the method for the multiphase flow simulation is validated by investing drops dripping from a pore. The numerical results are compared with either those from other researchers or experimental data. Good agreement is achieved. The method is also used to investigate the impact of a droplet on a grooved substrate and droplet generation in flow focusing devices.     

Numerical simulation of free surface flows with the level set method using an extremely high-order accuracy WENO advection scheme

Three-dimensional dynamic gas–liquid flow simulations that accurately track the phase interface are numerically challenging. This article presents a numerical study of the performance of the level-set phase–interface tracking method when combined with extremely high order (7th to 11th) weighted essentially non-oscillatory (WENO) advection schemes for gas–liquid free surface flows. Comparisons between simulation results and prior benchmark results suggest that such a combination of methods can be satisfactorily applied to the level-set and Navier-Stokes equations for free surface flow simulations when volume conservation is enforced at every time step, and minor numerical oscillations are suppressed through use of an artificial viscosity term. In particular, simulations of solid body rotation, the unsteady flow following an ideal dam break, tank sloshing, and the rise of a single bubble all agree with analytical or experimental results to within ± 3.12% when the level-set method is combined with an 11th order WENO scheme. Furthermore, use of an 11th order WENO advection scheme actually has a computational cost advantage because, for the same accuracy, it can be used on a coarser grid when compared with a more-common second-order advection scheme; computational savings of up to 87% are possible.     

一种可考虑界面不连续的改进SPH方法

SPH方法模拟工程问题时通常遇到不连续的物理量,因此有必要引入不连续的SPH方法.本文基于Taylor展开公式推导了2D和3D的不连续SPH公式.针对越过材料界面不连续物理量的计算,给出了大变形计算中确定不连续位置的方法,基于Taylor展开公式,从理论上给出了确定不连续公式中x_(k)点的方法,并用数值方法验证了此方法的有效性.比较和讨论了初始SPH方法,CSPM方法与不连续SPH方法处理不连续量的效果.结果显示不连续SPH方法在计算不连续量时有较大的优势.     

High-resolution algorithms of sharp interface treatment for compressible two-phase flows

In this paper, a kind of arbitrary high order derivatives (ADER) scheme based on the generalised Riemann problem is proposed to simulate multi-material flows by a coupling ghost fluid method. The states at cell interfaces are reconstructed by interpolating polynomials which are piece-wise smooth functions. The states are treated as the equivalent of the left and right states of the Riemann problem. The contact solvers are extrapolated in the vicinity of contact points to facilitate ghost fluids. The numerical method is applied to compressible flows with sharp discontinuities, such as the collision of two fluids of different physical states and gas–liquid two-phase flows. The numerical results demonstrate that unexpected physical oscillations through the contact discontinuities can be prevented effectively and the sharp interface can be captured efficiently.     

An analytical interface reconstruction algorithm in the PLIC‐VOF method for 2D polygonal unstructured meshes

Piecewise linear interface calculation (PLIC) schemes have been extensively employed in the volume‐of‐fluid (VOF) method for interface capturing in numerical simulations of multiphase flows. Polygonal unstructured meshes are often adopted because of their geometric flexibility and superiority in gradient calculation. An analytical interface reconstruction algorithm in the PLIC‐VOF method for arbitrary convex polygonal cells has been proposed in this study. The line interface at a given orientation within a polygonal cell is located by an analytical technique. It has been tested successfully for four different geometric shapes that are common in polygonal meshes. The computational efficiency of the present algorithm has been compared with several published schemes in the literature. The proposed algorithm has been shown to yield higher accuracy with reduction in computational complexity. A numerical simulation of a dam‐breaking problem has been performed using the proposed analytical PLIC technique on polygonal meshes. The results are in good agreement with experimental data available in the literature, which serves as a demonstration of its performance in a real multiphase flow.     

A coupled level set and volume-of-fluid method for sharp interface simulation of plunging breaking waves

A coupled level set and volume-of-fluid (CLSVOF) method is implemented for the numerical simulations of interfacial flows in ship hydrodynamics. The interface is reconstructed via a piecewise linear interface construction scheme and is advected using a Lagrangian method with a second-order Runge–Kutta scheme for time integration. The level set function is re-distanced based on the reconstructed interface with an efficient re-distance algorithm. This level set re-distance algorithm significantly simplifies the complicated geometric procedure and is especially efficient for three-dimensional (3D) cases. The CLSVOF scheme is incorporated into CFDShip-Iowa version 6, a sharp interface Cartesian grid solver for two-phase incompressible flows with the interface represented by the level set method and the interface jump conditions handled using a ghost fluid methodology. The performance of the CLSVOF method is first evaluated through the numerical benchmark tests with prescribed velocity fields, which shows superior mass conservation property over the level set method. With combination of the flow solver, a gas bubble rising in a viscous liquid and a water drop impact onto a deep water pool are modeled. The computed results are compared with the available numerical and experimental results, and good agreement is obtained. Wave breaking of a steep Stokes wave is also modeled and the results are very close to the available numerical results. Finally, plunging wave breaking over a submerged bump is simulated. The overall wave breaking process and major events are identified from the wave profiles of the simulations, which are qualitatively validated by the complementary experimental data. The flow structures are also compared with the experimental data, and similar flow trends have been observed.     

Analytical interface reconstruction algorithms in the PLIC-VOF method for 3D polyhedral unstructured meshes

Piecewise linear interface calculation (PLIC) schemes have been extensively employed in the volume-of-fluid (VOF) method for interface capturing in numerical simulations of multiphase flows. Polyhedral unstructured meshes are often adopted due to their geometric flexibility and superiority in gradient calculation. Four analytical interface reconstruction algorithms in the PLIC-VOF method for arbitrary convex polyhedral cells have been proposed in this study. The plane interface at a given orientation within a polyhedral cell is located by four different analytical techniques. They have been tested successfully for six different geometric shapes that are common in polyhedral meshes. The computational efficiencies of the algorithms have been compared with two other published schemes in the literature. The proposed algorithms have been shown to yield smaller truncation errors with reduction in computational complexity. A numerical simulation of a 3D dam-breaking problem has been successfully performed using the proposed interface reconstruction scheme on a polyhedral mesh. The percentage of the overall computational time consumed has been assessed to justify its optimization in a real multiphase flow simulation.     

Onset of shear-layer instability at the interface of parallel Couette flows

A non-planar or a bilateral mixing-layer is studied by means of a series of direct numerical simulations (DNSs). This mixing-layer forms at the interface of two co-current plane Couette flows of different Reynolds numbers. The current DNS study determined the conditions for the onset of shear-layer instability at the interface. The influence of different Reynolds number (of the co-current plane Couette flows) and their Reynolds number ratio on the mixing-layer is studied. A critical Reynolds number of about 500 (or more particularly one of the co-current plane Couette flows must be turbulent) and a Reynolds number ratio greater than 2 is required for the genesis of this bilateral shear-layer instability. Independent of the Reynolds number and the Reynolds number ratio, the temporal evolution of the shear-layer instability followed the same pattern. In addition, the oscillation frequency of the instability was found to increase with increasing Reynolds number and increasing Reynolds number ratio. Further, influence of instability on the local skin friction and the two-point correlation is elaborated on.     

Interface defeat of ceramic armor

界面击溃效应(interface defeat)是射弹撞击陶瓷材料过程中,陶瓷表面产生的特有现象.国内外学者在近30年来对陶瓷界面击溃效应开展的大量研究工作表明界面击溃效应中射弹界面驻留(dwell)时间的增加以及界面击溃/侵彻转变速度的升高能够大量消耗弹体动能、有效提高装甲陶瓷的抗弹性能.本文主要从实验、理论和数值模拟三方面介绍国内外学者开展的工作,包括陶瓷界面击溃效应的宏观与微观力学机制及其研究方法等.针对现今对界面击溃效应研究的不足, 提出了关于未来研究方向的建议.     

An efficient and accurate algebraic interface capturing method for unstructured grids in 2 and 3 dimensions: The THINC method with quadratic surface representation

We present in this paper an efficient and accurate volume of fluid (VOF) type scheme to compute moving interfaces on unstructured grids with arbitrary quadrilateral mesh elements in 2D and hexahedral elements in 3D. Being an extension of the multi‐dimensional tangent of hyperbola interface capturing (THINC) reconstruction proposed by the authors in Cartesian grid, an algebraic VOF scheme is devised for arbitrary quadrilateral and hexahedral elements. The interface is cell‐wisely approximated by a quadratic surface, which substantially improves the numerical accuracy. The same as the other THINC type schemes, the present method does not require the explicit geometric representation of the interface when computing numerical fluxes and thus is very computationally efficient and straightforward in implementation. The proposed scheme has been verified by benchmark tests, which reveal that this scheme is able to produce high‐quality numerical solutions of moving interfaces in unstructured grids and thus a practical method for interfacial multi‐phase flow simulations. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A sharp interface Cartesian grid method for viscous simulation of shocked particle-laden flows

A Cartesian grid-based sharp interface method is presented for viscous simulations of shocked particle-laden flows. The moving solid–fluid interfaces are represented using level sets. A moving least-squares reconstruction is developed to apply the no-slip boundary condition at solid–fluid interfaces and to supply viscous stresses to the fluid. The algorithms developed in this paper are benchmarked against similarity solutions for the boundary layer over a fixed flat plate and against numerical solutions for moving interface problems such as shock-induced lift-off of a cylinder in a channel. The framework is extended to 3D and applied to calculate low Reynolds number steady supersonic flow over a sphere. Viscous simulation of the interaction of a particle cloud with an incident planar shock is demonstrated; the average drag on the particles and the vorticity field in the cloud are compared to the inviscid case to elucidate the effects of viscosity on momentum transfer between the particle and fluid phases. The methods developed will be useful for obtaining accurate momentum and heat transfer closure models for macro-scale shocked particulate flow applications such as blast waves and dust explosions.     

Numerical simulation of compressible two-phase flow using a diffuse interface method

In this article, a high-resolution diffuse interface method is investigated for simulation of compressible two-phase gas–gas and gas–liquid flows, both in the presence of shock wave and in flows with strong rarefaction waves similar to cavitations. A Godunov method and HLLC Riemann solver is used for discretization of the Kapila five-equation model and a modified Schmidt equation of state (EOS) is used to simulate the cavitation regions. This method is applied successfully to some one- and two-dimensional compressible two-phase flows with interface conditions that contain shock wave and cavitations. The numerical results obtained in this attempt exhibit very good agreement with experimental results, as well as previous numerical results presented by other researchers based on other numerical methods. In particular, the algorithm can capture the complex flow features of transient shocks, such as the material discontinuities and interfacial instabilities, without any oscillation and additional diffusion. Numerical examples show that the results of the method presented here compare well with other sophisticated modeling methods like adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) and local mesh refinement (LMR) for one- and two-dimensional problems.     

A cost‐effective curvature calculation approach for interfacial flows on unstructured meshes

We present a simple and cost‐effective curvature calculation approach for simulations of interfacial flows on structured and unstructured grids. The interface is defined using volume fractions, and the interface curvature is obtained as a function of the gradients of volume fractions. The gradient computation is based on a recently proposed gradient recovery method that mimicks the least squares approach without the need to solve a system of equations and is quite easy to implement on arbitrary polygonal meshes. The resulting interface curvature is used in a continuum surface force formulation within the framework of a well‐balanced finite‐volume algorithm to simulate multiphase flows dominated by surface tension. We show that the proposed curvature calculation is at least as accurate as some of the existing approaches on unstructured meshes while being straightforward to implement on any mesh topology. Numerical investigations also show that spurious currents in stationary problems that are dependent on the curvature calculation methodology are also acceptably low using the proposed approach. Studies on capillary waves and rising bubbles in viscous flows lend credence to the ability of the proposed method as an inexpensive, robust, and reasonably accurate approach for curvature calculation and numerical simulation of multiphase flows.     

A diffuse-interface approach to two-phase isothermal flow of a Van der Waals fluid near the critical point

A novel numerical method for simulations of isothermal, compressible two-phase flows of one fluid component near the critical point is presented on the basis of a diffuse-interface model and a Van der Waals equation of state. Because of the non-convexity of the latter, the nature of the set of governing equations is mixed hyperbolic–elliptic. This prevents the application of standard numerical methods for compressible flow. Moreover, the Korteweg capillary stress tensor, characteristic for the diffuse-interface approach, introduces third-order spatial derivatives of mass density in the Navier–Stokes equation, resulting in a dispersive behavior of the solution. Our computational method relies on a transformation of the conserved variables, which controls dispersion, stabilizes the numerical simulation and enables the use of coarser grids. A one-dimensional simulation shows that this method provides better stability and accuracy than without transformation of variables. Two- and three-dimensional simulations for isothermal liquid–vapor flows, in particular the retraction of a liquid non-spherical drop in vapor and the binary droplet collision in vapor, show the applicability of the method. The surface tension calculated from the numerical results is in good agreement with its theoretical value if the computational grid is sufficiently fine.