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To better understand the atmosphere, the Great Red Spot of Jupiter, and other fluids that move predominantly in two dimensions, researchers have studied how 2-dimensional turbulent flows shed energy. Towards these ends, University of Pittsburgh researchers created turbulence in a salt-based soap film, by sending electric and magnetic fields through it. In the above snapshot of the film, the height indicates high and low pressure regions in the cell, the colors represent vorticity (green is positive and blue is negative), while finally the vectors (arrows) are the flow field of the fluid at that instant. the colors represent vorticity (green is positive and blue is negative), while finally the vectors are the flow field of the fluid at that instant.
Click here to download a 5MB zipped movie of the velocity fields extracted with a high-speed camera over a period of a second.
Thanks to Mike Rivera and X.L. Wu at the University of Pittsburgh for the figures and much of the caption.
Reported by: Michael Rivera and X.L. Wu in Physical Review Letters (31 July 2000)