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Updated: May 30, 2026

The Diffusion of Passive Tracers in Laminar Shear Flow
Published on: May 1, 2018
Anomalous scaling of passive scalars in rotating flows
P Rodriguez Imazio1, P D Mininni
1Departamento de Física, Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales, Universidad de Buenos Aires and IFIBA, CONICET, Cuidad Universitaria, Buenos Aires 1428, Argentina.
Abstract:
We present results of direct numerical simulations of passive scalar advection and diffusion in turbulent rotating flows. Scaling laws and the development of anisotropy are studied in spectral space, and in real space using an axisymmetric decomposition of velocity and passive scalar structure functions. The passive scalar is more anisotropic than the velocity field, and its power spectrum follows a spectral law consistent with ~ k[Please see text](-3/2). This scaling is explained with phenomenological arguments that consider the effect of rotation. Intermittency is characterized using scaling exponents and probability density functions of velocity and passive scalar increments. In the presence of rotation, intermittency in the velocity field decreases more noticeably than in the passive scalar. The scaling exponents show good agreement with Kraichnan's prediction for passive scalar intermittency in two dimensions, after correcting for the observed scaling of the second-order exponent.
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