1/f noise in turbulent flows

Abstract

We report the experimental observation of $1/f$ fluctuations in three different turbulent flow configurations: the large scale velocity driven by a two-dimensional turbulent flow, the magnetic field generated by a turbulent swirling flow of liquid sodium and the pressure fluctuations due to vorticity filaments in a swirling flow. For these three systems, $1/f$ noise is shown to result from the dynamics of coherent structures that display transitions between a small number of states. The interevent duration is distributed as a power-law. The exponent of this power-law and the nature of the dynamics (transition between symmetric states or asymmetric ones) select the exponent of the $1/f$ fluctuations.