Direct numerical simulation of turbulent thermal boundary layers

In this paper, a method of generating realistic turbulent temperature fluctuations at a computational inlet is proposed and direct numerical simulations of turbulent thermal boundary layers developing on a flat plate with isothermal and isoflux wall boundary conditions are carried out. Governing equations are integrated using a fully implicit fractional-step method with 352x64x128 grids for the Reynolds number of 300, based on the free-stream velocity and the inlet momentum thickness, and the Prandtl number of 0.71. The computed Stanton numbers for the isothermal and isoflux walls are in good agreement with power-law relations without transient region from the inlet. The mean statistical quantities including root-mean-square temperature fluctuations, turbulent heat fluxes, turbulent Prandtl number, and skewness and flatness of temperature fluctuations agree well with existing experimental and numerical data. A quadrant analysis is performed to investigate the coherence between the velocity and temperature fluctuations. It is shown that the behavior of the wall-normal heat flux is similar to that of the Reynolds shear stress, indicating close correlation between the streamwise velocity and temperature. The effect of different thermal boundary conditions at the wall on the near-wall turbulence statistics is also discussed. (C) 2000 American Institute of Physics. [S1070-6631(00)50510-8].