Quantum Turbulence: Vortex Bundle Collapse and Kolmogorov Spectrum

Makoto Tsubota, Michikazu Kobayashi

Andrew William Baggaley, Jason Laurie, Carlo Barenghi

Measurements of the energy spectrum and of the vortex-density fluctuation spectrum in superfluid turbulence seem to contradict each other. Using a numerical model, we show that at each instance of time the total vortex line density can be decomposed into two parts: one formed by metastable bundles of coherent vortices, and one in which the vortices are randomly oriented. We show that the former is responsible for the observed Kolmogorov energy spectrum, and the latter for the spectrum of the vortex line density fluctuations.

Enrico Fonda, Katepalli R. Sreenivasan, Daniel Perry Lathrop

Makoto Tsubota, Kenichi Kasamatsu

Andrew William Baggaley, Jason Laurie, Carlo F. Barenghi

Measurements of the energy spectrum and of the vortex-density fluctuation spectrum in superfluid turbulence seem to contradict each other. Using a numerical model, we show that at each instance of time the total vortex line density can be decomposed into two parts: one formed by metastable bundles of coherent vortices, and one in which the vortices are randomly oriented. We show that the former is responsible for the observed Kolmogorov energy spectrum, and the latter for the spectrum of the vortex line density fluctuations.

Jeffrey Yepez, George Vahala, Linda L. Vahala +1 more

The main topological feature of a superfluid is a quantum vortex with an identifiable inner and outer radius. A novel unitary quantum lattice gas algorithm is used to simulate quantum turbulence of a Bose-Einstein condensate superfluid described by the Gross-Pitaevskii equation on grids up to 5760(3). For the first time, an accurate power-law scaling for the quantum Kelvin wave cascade is determined: k(-3). The incompressible kinetic energy spectrum exhibits very distinct power-law spectra in 3 ranges of k space: a classical Kolmogorov k(-(5/3)) spectrum at scales greater than the outer radius of individual quantum vortex cores and a quantum Kelvin wave cascade spectrum k(-3) on scales smaller than the inner radius of the quantum vortex core. The k(-3) quantum Kelvin wave spectrum due to phonon radiation is robust, while the k(-(5/3)) classical Kolmogorov spectrum becomes robust on large grids.