Travelling-wave solutions bifurcating from relative periodic orbits in plane Poiseuille flow

Abstract

Travelling-wave solutions are shown to bifurcate from relative periodic orbits in plane Poiseuille flow at Re = 2000 in a saddle-node infinite period bifurcation. These solutions consist in self-sustaining sinuous quasi-streamwise streaks and quasi- streamwise vortices located in the bulk of the flow. The lower branch travelling-wave solutions evolve into spanwise localized states when the spanwise size Lz of the domain in which they are computed is increased. On the contrary, upper branch of travelling-wave solutions develop multiple streaks when Lz is increased. Upper branch travelling-wave solutions can be continued into coherent solutions of the filtered equations used in large-eddy simulations where they represent turbulent coherent large-scale motions.