Enstrophy evolution during head-on wall interaction of premixed flames within turbulent boundary layers

The statistical behaviors of mean enstrophy and its evolution during head-on interaction of premixed flames propagating toward a chemically inert flat wall across the turbulent boundary layer have been analyzed using direct numerical simulations for a friction velocity-based Reynolds number of Re-tau = 110. The enstrophy dynamics have been analyzed for both isothermal and adiabatic thermal wall boundary conditions. The contributions of vortex-stretching and viscous dissipation are found to be leading order source and sink, respectively, to the mean enstrophy transport in both non-reacting and reacting flows irrespective of the wall boundary condition. However, the contributions due to dilatation rate and baroclinic torque play important roles in addition to the leading order contributions of the vortex-stretching and viscous dissipation terms in the enstrophy transport in turbulent premixed flames. The thermal boundary condition has been demonstrated to affect the near-wall behavior of the enstrophy transport contribution due to dilatation rate, which also affects the near-wall distribution of the enstrophy. The magnitudes of the leading order contributors to the enstrophy transport decrease with the progress of head-on interaction for both wall boundary conditions. Moreover, the overall sink contributions to the enstrophy transport dominate over the source contributions, giving rise to a drop in the mean enstrophy with the progress of head-on interaction. The enstrophy distribution changes significantly during flame-wall interaction, which gives rise to a modification of the relative proportion of the coherent structures in the reacting flow turbulent boundary layer compared to the corresponding non-reacting flow features. (C) 2022 Author(s).