Lighthill’s mechanism and vorticity cascade in the logarithmic layer of wall turbulence

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We investigate Lighthill’s proposed turbulent mechanism for near-wall concentration of spanwise vorticity by calculating mean flows conditioned on motion away from or toward the wall in an (friction Reynolds number) Re_τ =1000 database of plane-parallel channel flow. Our results corroborate Lighthill’s proposal throughout the entire logarithmic layer, but extended by counter-flows that help explain anti-correlation of vorticity transport by advection and by stretching/tilting. We present evidence also for Lighthill’s hypothesis that the vorticity transport in the log layer is a ‘cascade process’ through a scale hierarchy of eddies, with intense competition between transport outward from and inward to the wall. Townsend’s model of attached eddies of hairpin-vortex type accounts for half of the vorticity cascade, whereas we identify necklace type or ’shawl vortices’ that envelop turbulent sweeps as supplying the other half.