Kolmogorov's dissipation number and the number of degrees of freedom for the 3D Navier–Stokes equations

Kolmogorov's theory of turbulence predicts that only wavenumbers below some critical value, called Kolmogorov's dissipation number, are essential to describe the evolution of a three-dimensional (3D) fluid flow. A determining wavenumber, first introduced by Foias and Prodi for the 2D Navier–Stokes equations, is a mathematical analogue of Kolmogorov's number. The purpose of this paper is to prove the existence of a time-dependent determining wavenumber for the 3D Navier–Stokes equations whose time average is bounded by Kolmogorov's dissipation wavenumber for all solutions on the global attractor whose intermittency is not extreme.