Abstract
Classification of flow fields involving strong vortices such as those from bluff body wakes and animal locomotion can provide important insight to their hydrodynamic behavior. Previous work has successfully classified 2D flow fields based on critical points of the velocity field and the structure of an associated weighted graph using the critical points as vertices. The present work focuses on extension of this approach to 3D flows. To this end, we have used the Gauss-Bonnet theorem to find critical points and their indices in the 3D velocity vector field, which functions similarly to the Poincare-Bendixon theorem in 2D flow fields. The approach utilizes an initial search for critical points based on local flow field direction, and the Gauss-Bonnet theorem is used to refine the location of critical points by dividing the volume integral form of the Gauss-Bonnet theorem into smaller regions. The developed method is cable of locating critical points at sub-grid level precision, which is a key factor for locating critical points and determining their associated eigenvalues on coarse grids. To verify this approach, we have applied this method on sample flow fields generated from potential flow theory and numerical methods.
Degree Date
Spring 2020
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
M.S.M.E.
Department
Mechanical Engineering
Advisor
Prof. Paul S. Krueger
Subject Area
Mechanical Engineering
Number of Pages
62
Format
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License
Recommended Citation
Zharfa, Mohammadreza, "Critical Point Identification In 3D Velocity Fields" (2020). Mechanical Engineering Research Theses and Dissertations. 27.
https://scholar.smu.edu/engineering_mechanical_etds/27
