Time scales of turbulent relative dispersion

Tracers in a turbulent flow separate according to the celebrated t3/2 Richardson-Obukhov law, which is usually explained by a scale-dependent effective diffusivity. Here, supported by state-of-the-art numerics, we revisit this argument. The Lagrangian correlation time of velocity differences increases too quickly for validating this approach, but acceleration differences decorrelate on dissipative time scales. Phenomenological arguments are used to relate the behavior of separations to that of a "local energy dissipation," defined as the average ratio between the cube of the longitudinal velocity difference and the distance between the two tracers. This quantity is shown to stabilize on short time scales and this results in an asymptotic diffusion ∝t1/2 of velocity differences. The time of convergence to this regime is shown to be that of deviations from Batchelor's initial ballistic regime, given by a scale-dependent energy dissipation time rather than the usual turnover time. It is finally demonstrated that the fluid flow intermittency should not affect this long-time behavior of the relative motion.