Scaling of heat flux and energy spectrum for "very large" Prandtl number convection

Abstract

Under the limit of infinite Prandtl number, we derive analytical expressions for the large-scale quantities, e.g., Péclet number Pe, Nusselt number Nu, and rms value of the temperature fluctuations $θ_\mathrm{rms}$. We complement the analytical work with direct numerical simulations, and show that $\mathrm{Nu} \sim \mathrm{Ra}^γ$ with $γ\approx (0.30-0.32)$, $\mathrm{Pe} \sim \mathrm{Ra}^η$ with $η\approx (0.57-0.61)$, and $θ_\mathrm{rms} \sim \mathrm{const}$. The Nusselt number is observed to be an intricate function of $\mathrm{Pe}$, $θ_\mathrm{rms}$, and a correlation function between the vertical velocity and temperature. Using the scaling of large-scale fields, we show that the energy spectrum $E_u(k)\sim k^{-13/3}$, which is in a very good agreement with our numerical results. The entropy spectrum $E_θ(k)$ however exhibits dual branches consisting of $k^{-2}$ and $k^0$ spectra; the $k^{-2}$ branch corresponds to the Fourier modes $\hatθ(0,0,2n)$, which are approximately $-1/(2n π)$. The scaling relations for Prandtl number beyond $10^2$ match with those for infinite Prandtl number.