Relative particle dispersion in two-dimensional and quasi-geostrophic turbulence

In this paper, phenomenological developments are used to explore relative particle dispersion (RPD) in two-dimensional (2D) and quasi-geostrophic (QG) fully-developed turbulence (FDT). The role played by the 2D and QG FDT cascade physics underlying this process is given special attention. Prevalence of spatial intermittency effects in 2D FDT enstrophy cascade, however small, is shown to lead to a structural change in the RPD growth law, more specifically the development of power-law scaling of RPD; this corroborates the difficulty in observing Lin’s (1972) exponential scaling law in laboratory experiments (Jullien (2003)). QG effects are found to lead to an enhanced RPD in the baroclinic regime of the energy cascade, which seems to be traceable to a negative eddy-viscosity characterizing the latter regime. They are also found to lead to particle clumping in the baroclinic regime of the enstrophy cascade (this aspect appears to be associated with the tendency of divorticity sheets to occur near the vortex nulls where particle clumping is known, as per numerical simulations and laboratory experiments, to be favored to occur). These results are developed from the established scaling relations for 2D and QG FDT and are validated further via alternative dimensional/scaling developments for 2D and QG FDT similar to the one given for 3D FDT by Batchelor and Townsend (1956). The feasibility of spatial intermittency effects is underscored via the nonlinear scaling dependence of RPD on the enstrophy (or energy) dissipation rate. •We explore relative particle dispersion in 2D and quasi-geostrophic fully-developed turbulence.•The role played by the cascade physics underlying this process is given special attention.