Paranjape Chaitanya S, Yalnız Gökhan, Duguet Yohann, Budanur Nazmi Burak, Hof Björn
Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA), 3400 Klosterneuburg, Austria.
LISN-CNRS, Campus Universitaire d'Orsay, Université Paris-Saclay, 91405 Orsay, France.
Phys Rev Lett. 2023 Jul 21;131(3):034002. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.131.034002.
Viscous flows through pipes and channels are steady and ordered until, with increasing velocity, the laminar motion catastrophically breaks down and gives way to turbulence. How this apparently discontinuous change from low- to high-dimensional motion can be rationalized within the framework of the Navier-Stokes equations is not well understood. Exploiting geometrical properties of transitional channel flow we trace turbulence to far lower Reynolds numbers (Re) than previously possible and identify the complete path that reversibly links fully turbulent motion to an invariant solution. This precursor of turbulence destabilizes rapidly with Re, and the accompanying explosive increase in attractor dimension effectively marks the transition between deterministic and de facto stochastic dynamics.
