Study on the formation of Goertler vortices in natural convection flow over a rotating concave surface

This paper presents a numerical study of the formation of Goertler vortices in natural convection flow over a concave surface with rotation. The onset position characterized by the Grashof number Grδr, depends on the rotational Reynolds number, the Prandtl number (Pr = 0.7 for air) and the wave number. The buoyancy force and Coriolis force are found to significantly affect the flow structure and heat transfer. However, centrifugal force has minor stabilizing effect on the flow. Positive rotation stabilizes the boundary layer flow on the concave surface. On the contrary, negative rotation destabilizes the flow. The numerical data show reasonable agreement with the experimental results in the case of zero rotation.