Acoustic turbulence: from the Zakharov-Sagdeev spectra to the Kadomtsev-Petviashvili spectrum

Abstract

This paper presents a brief review on theoretical and numerical works on three-dimensional acoustic turbulence both in a weakly nonlinear regime, when the amplitudes of sound waves are small, and in the case of strong nonlinearity. This review is based on the classical studies on weak acoustic turbulence by V.E. Zakharov (1965) and V.E. Zakharov and R.Z. Sagdeev (1970), on the one hand, and on the other hand, by B.B. Kadomtsev and V.I. Petviashvili (1972). Until recently, there were no convincing numerical experiments confirming one or the other point of view. In the works of the authors of this review in 2022 and 2024, strong arguments were found based on direct numerical modeling in favor of both theories. It is shown that the Zakharov-Sagdeev spectrum of weak turbulence $\propto k^{-3/2}$ is realized not only for small positive dispersion of sound waves, but also in the case of complete absence of dispersion. The calculated turbulence spectra in the weakly nonlinear regime have anisotropic distribution: for small $k$, narrow cones (jets) are formed, broadening in the Fourier space. For weak dispersion, the jets are smoothed out, and the turbulence spectrum tends to be isotropic in the region of short wavelengths. In the absence of dispersion, the turbulence spectrum is a discrete set of jets subjected to diffraction divergence. For each individual jet, nonlinear effects are much weaker than diffraction ones, which prevents the formation of shock waves. Thus, the Zakharov-Sagdeev spectrum is realized due to the smallness of nonlinear effects compared to dispersion or diffraction. As the pumping level increases in the non-dispersive regime, when nonlinear effects begin to dominate, shock waves are formed. As a result, acoustic turbulence passes into a strongly nonlinear state in the form of an ensemble of random shocks described by the Kadomtsev-Petviashvili spectrum $\propto k^{-2}$.