Richtmyer-Meshkov turbulent mixing arising from an inclined material interface with realistic surface perturbations and reshocked flow

This paper presents a numerical study of turbulent mixing due to the interaction of a shock wave with an inclined material interface. The interface between the two gases is modeled by geometrical random multimode perturbations represented by different surface perturbation power spectra with the same standard deviation. Simulations of the Richtmyer-Meshkov instability and associated turbulent mixing have been performed using high-resolution implicit large eddy simulations. Qualitative comparisons with experimental flow visualizations are presented. The key integral properties have been examined for different interface perturbations. It is shown that turbulent mixing is reduced when the initial perturbations are concentrated at short wavelengths. The form of the initial perturbation has strong effects on the development of small-scale flow structures, but this effect is diminished at late times. © 2011 British Crown.