Moffatt vortex

Moffatt vortex is a term from fluid mechanics named after the physicist Keith Moffatt .

In the case of flows over corners or depressions, the angle of which falls below a critical value _c , a (theoretically infinite) sequence of continuously decreasing corner eddies always occurs . These corner vertebrae drop significantly in strength. ${\displaystyle \alpha }$ ${\displaystyle \alpha }$

The critical angle for the occurrence of corner vertebrae is exactly _c = 146.3 degrees. Theoretically, each corner vortex has an intensity around a thousand times less than the previous one. S. Taneda was therefore only able to prove experimentally two corner vertebrae even with a 90-minute exposure time. ${\displaystyle \alpha }$

literature

• HK Moffatt: Viscous and resistive eddies near a sharp corner , Journal of Fluid Mechanics, Volume 18, 1964, pp. 1-18.
• S. Taneda: Visualization of separating Stokes flows , Journal of the Physical Society of Japan, Volume 46, 1979, pp. 1935-1942. Abstract