Assessing the Inhomogeneous Pressure-Strain

The fluctuating pressure term in the Reynolds-stress equation is conventionally decomposed into a strain and a diffusion term. The pressure-strain can be further decomposed into a homogeneous and an inhomogeneous part. The homogeneous pressure-strain has been the focus of substantial modeling efforts, typically relying on tensor representation theorems. However, for flows with strong local gradients, the inhomogeneous pressure-strain can be a substantial contributor the Reynolds-stress budget. Using pseudo-spectral direct-numerical simulation we obtain budgets for the Reynolds-stress equation to show the precise impact of the inhomogeneous pressure-strain term. We then propose new modeling strategies that include this contribution.