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  • Open Access

Kolmogorov Scaling in Bubble-Induced Turbulence

Tian Ma1,*, Shiyong Tan2, Rui Ni2, Hendrik Hessenkemper1,†, and Andrew D. Bragg3,‡

  • *Contact author: tian.ma@hzdr.de
  • †Contact author: h.hessenkemper@hzdr.de
  • ‡Contact author: andrew.bragg@duke.edu
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Phys. Rev. Lett. 134, 244001 – Published 20 June, 2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/v9mh-7pw1

Abstract

Experiments using 3D Lagrangian tracking are used to investigate Kolmogorov scaling below the bubble size in bubble-induced turbulence (BIT). Second- and third-order structure functions reveal approximate Kolmogorov scaling for homogeneous bubble swarms. A new scaling for the kinetic energy dissipation rate is derived and shown to be in excellent agreement with the data. Using this we predict the scale separation below the bubble size as a function of the parameters and find that a large inertial range is not possible in BIT since bubbles of the required size would quickly break down.

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Phys. Rev. Lett. 134, 244001– Published 20 June, 2025
  • Received 2 January 2025
  • Accepted 9 May 2025
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI.

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