Selective control of flow coherence in triangular jets

The triangular jet was investigated for use as a passive device to enhance fine-scale mixing and to reduce the coherence of large-scale structures in the flow. The suppression of the structures is vital to the enhancement of molecular mixing, which is important for efficient chemical reactions including combustion. The sharp corners in the jet injector introduced high instability modes into the flow via the non-symmetric mean velocity and pressure distribution around the nozzle. Both aerodynamic and hydrodynamic flows showed the difference between the flow at the corner (vertex) and at the flat side. While highly coherent structures could be generated at the flat side, the corner flow was dominated by highly turbulent small-scale eddies. The flow characteristics were tested using hotwire anemometry for mean flow and turbulence analysis, and flow visualization in air and water.