Large-eddy simulations of Richtmyer–Meshkov instability in a converging geometry

Abstract

The Richtmyer–Meshkov instability RMI refers to the baroclinic generation of vorticity at a perturbed density interface when impacted by a shock wave. It is often thought of as the impulsive limit of the Rayleigh–Taylor instability. While the RMI has been widely covered in planar geometries see, for example, Ref. 1, the present simulations investigate the mixing of materials resulting from the interaction of an imploding cylindrical shock wave with a concentric interface, perturbed in both axial and azimuthal directions, which separates outside air from SF_6 initially 5 times denser confined in a 90° wedge. Two incident shocks of Mach numbers M_i=1.3 and 2.0 at initial impact are tested. These canonical simulations support recent work on understanding the compressible turbulent mixing in converging geometries relevant to both inertial confinement fusion and core-collapse supernova dynamics.

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