Spectral analysis of turbulence based on the DNS of a channel flow

The development and assessment of spectral turbulence models requires knowledge of the spectral turbulent kinetic energy distribution as well as an understanding of the terms which determine the energy distribution in physical and wave number space. Direct numerical simulation (DNS) of turbulent channel flow yields numerical “data” that can be, and was, analyzed using a spatial Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) to obtain the various spectral turbulent kinetic energy balance terms, including the production, dissipation, diffusion, and the non-linear convective transfer terms.