Spatio-temporal dynamics of superstructures and vortices in turbulent Rayleigh–Bénard convection

Understanding turbulent thermal convection is essential for modeling many natural phenomena. This study investigates the spatiotemporal dynamics of the vortical structures in the mid-plane of turbulent Rayleigh–Bénard convection in SF6 via experiments. For this, a Rayleigh–Bénard cell of aspect ratio 10 is placed inside a pressure vessel and pressurized up to 1, 1.5, and 2.5 bar in order to reach Rayleigh numbers of Ra = 9.4×105,2.0×106, and 5.5×106, respectively. For all three cases, the Prandtl number is Pr =0.79 and ΔT≈7 K. Then, stereoscopic particle image velocimetry is conducted to measure the three velocity components in the horizontal-mid-plane for 5.78×103 free fall times. For the given aspect ratio, the flow is no longer dominated by the side walls of the cell and turbulent superstructures that show a two-dimensional repetitive organization form. These superstructures show diverse shapes with faster dissipation rates as Ra increases. Out-of-plane vortices are the main feature of the flow. As Ra increases, the number of these vortices also increases, and their size shrinks. However, their total number is almost constant for each Ra through the measurement period. Furthermore, their occurrence is random and does not depend on whether the flow is upward-heated, downward-cooled, or horizontally directed. Vortex tracking was applied to measure lifetime, displacement, and traveled distance of these structures. The relation between lifetime and traveled distance is rather linear. Interestingly, in the vortex centers, the out-of-plane momentum transport is larger in comparison to the bulk flow. Therefore, these vortices will play a major role in the heat transport in such flows.