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Accumulation of motile elongated micro-organisms in turbulence

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 December 2013

Caijuan Zhan ,
Gaetano Sardina ,
Enkeleida Lushi  and
Luca Brandt
Caijuan Zhan
Affiliation:
Linné Flow Centre and SeRC (Swedish e-Science Research Centre), KTH Mechanics, SE-100 44, Stockholm, Sweden
Gaetano Sardina
Affiliation:
Linné Flow Centre and SeRC (Swedish e-Science Research Centre), KTH Mechanics, SE-100 44, Stockholm, Sweden Facoltá di Ingegneria, Architettura e Scienze Motorie, UKE Universitá Kore di Enna, 94100 Enna, Italy
Enkeleida Lushi
Affiliation:
School of Engineering, Brown University, 182 Hope Street, Providence, RI 02912, USA
Luca Brandt*
Affiliation:
Linné Flow Centre and SeRC (Swedish e-Science Research Centre), KTH Mechanics, SE-100 44, Stockholm, Sweden
*
†Email address for correspondence: luca@mech.kth.se
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Abstract

We study the effect of turbulence on marine life by performing numerical simulations of motile micro-organisms, modelled as prolate spheroids, in isotropic homogeneous turbulence. We show that the clustering and patchiness observed in laminar flows, linear shear and vortex flows, are significantly reduced in a three-dimensional turbulent flow mainly because of the complex topology; elongated micro-organisms show some level of clustering in the case of swimmers without any preferential alignment whereas spherical swimmers remain uniformly distributed. Micro-organisms with one preferential swimming direction (e.g. gyrotaxis) still show significant clustering if spherical in shape, whereas prolate swimmers remain more uniformly distributed. Due to their large sensitivity to the local shear, these elongated swimmers react more slowly to the action of vorticity and gravity and therefore do not have time to accumulate in a turbulent flow. These results show how purely hydrodynamic effects can alter the ecology of micro-organisms that can vary their shape and their preferential orientation.

JFM classification

Biological Fluid Dynamics: Biological Fluid Dynamics Biological Fluid Dynamics: Micro-organism dynamics
Type
Papers
Information
Journal of Fluid Mechanics , Volume 739 , 25 January 2014 , pp. 22 - 36
Copyright
©2013 Cambridge University Press 

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