Transport equation scalar variance, inert

Starting with the scalar transport equation, a transport equation for the inert-scalar variance was derived in Section 3.3 ((3.105), p. 85) ... 

The transport equation for the variance of an inert scalar (

and Reynolds averaging the resultant expression. This process leads to an unclosed term of the form 2[Pg.103]

The inert-scalar-variance transport equation can then be written as... 

The failure of first-order moment closures for the treatment of mixing-sensitive reactions has led to the exploration of higher-order moment closures (Dutta and Tarbell 1989 Heeb and Brodkey 1990 Shenoy and Toor 1990). The simplest closures in this category attempt to relate the covariances of reactive scalars to the variance of the mixture fraction (I 2). The latter can be found by solving the inert-scalar-variance transport equation ((3.105), p. 85) along with the transport equation for (f). For example, for the one-step reaction in (5.54) the unknown scalar covariance can be approximated by... 

In scalar mixing studies and for infinite-rate reacting flows controlled by mixing, the variance of inert scalars is of interest since it is a measure of the local instantaneous departure of concentration from its local instantaneous mean value. For non-reactive flows the variance can be interpreted as a departure from locally perfect mixing. In this case the dissipation of concentration variance can be interpreted as mixing on the molecular scale. The scalar variance equation (1.462) can be derived from the scalar transport equation... 

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