A Hybrid Turbulence Approach for Simulation of Breaking Waves and Their Impacts on Coastal Structures
Lead Research Organisation:
Manchester Metropolitan University
Department Name: Computing and Mathematics
Abstract
Wave breaking occurs in many coastal and marine environments and is a complex physical process involving moving and overturning free surfaces (i.e. the water/air interface), flow turbulence, air entrainment effects as well as turbulent vortex flow interaction with boundary layers. The effects of wave breaking can be found in many natural and artificial coastal processes and can be hazardous to naval and coastal structures. While the mechanisms for wave breaking have been studied by a number of theoretical and experimental works, numerical modelling of such flow problems is still a challenge. In this project, a new strategy is proposed to simulate the complex turbulent flows involving wave breaking and its interaction with structures. A hybrid turbulence model (i.e. detached eddy simulation) will be incorporated into an existing efficient 3D two-fluid (water/air) free surface capturing code. This involves the extension and application of the hybrid turbulence technique to new areas of turbulence at free surface, a task which has never been attempted so far. The code will be optimised so it can run efficiently on a multiple CPU vector supercomputer. The developed code will be first validated against a number of well documented test cases involving wave breaking on a sloping beach and then will be applied to simulate test cases involving violent impacts of breaking waves due to high amplitude regular incoming waves at vertical and steeply sloping walls. A successful implementation of this technique within the free surface capturing code will enable new insights to be gained in greater detail, in a computaionally cost-effective manner, of turbulent free surface flow problems of practical and physical significance. The proposed research is of current interest to the coastal and marine engineering sectors and relevant to application areas such as a breaking wave overtopping fixed or floating offshore structures, ships and other marine devices.
People |
ORCID iD |
| Ling Qian (Principal Investigator) |
Publications
Ma Z
(2010)
A Cartesian ghost-cell multigrid Poisson solver for incompressible flows
in International Journal for Numerical Methods in Engineering
Qian L
(2011)
Comments on 'An improved free surface capturing method based on Cartesian cut cell mesh for water-entry and -exit problems'
in Proceedings of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences
Zhihua Ma (Co-Author)
(2011)
Simulation of solitary breaking waves using a two-fluid hybrid turbulence approach
Zhihua Ma (Co-Author)
(2010)
The Development of a Cartesian Ghost-Cell Method for Moving Boundary Problems
| Description | Wave breaking occurs in many coastal and marine environments and is a complex physical process involving moving and overturning free surfaces (i.e. the water/air interface), flow turbulence, air entrainment effects as well as turbulent vortex flow interaction with boundary layers. The effects of wave breaking can be found in many natural and artificial coastal processes and can be hazardous to naval and coastal structures. While the mechanisms for wave breaking have been studied by a number of theoretical and experimental works, numerical modelling of such flow problems is still a challenge. In this project, a new strategy has been implemented to simulate the complex turbulent flows involving wave breaking and its interaction with structures. A hybrid turbulence model (i.e. detached eddy simulation) has been incorporated into an existing efficient 2D/3D two-fluid (water/air) free surface capturing code. This involves the extension and application of the hybrid turbulence technique to new areas of turbulence at free surface, a task which has never been attempted before. The code has been optimised so it can run efficiently on a multiple CPU vector supercomputer. The developed code has been validated against a number of well documented test cases involving a solitary wave breaking on a sloping beach. A successful implementation of this technique within the free surface capturing code will enable new insights to be gained in greater detail, in a computaionally cost-effective manner, of turbulent free surface flow problems of practical and physical significance. The research is of current interest to the coastal and marine engineering sectors and relevant to application areas such as a breaking wave overtopping fixed or floating offshore structures, ships and other marine devices. |
| Exploitation Route | Publication citation. |
| Sectors | Environment |