Comparison of 2D and 3D simulations of a shock accelerated inclined gas column*

In our study, we conduct 3D large eddy simulations of a shock passing through a cylindrical column of gas in air.  In simulations, a gas column, initially at rest, is inclined at an angle of 30 degrees with respect to an approaching shock propagating at Mach 2.0.  After the column is accelerated by the shock, instabilities develop on the surface of the gas column:  a Richtmyer-Meshkov instability in the radial direction of the cylinder and a Kelvin-Helmholtz instability in the axial direction.  Statistical properties and turbulent kinetic energy spectra in both the radial and axial directions are collected at different times.  Results are compared with experimental data and our previous two-dimensional simulations.  The overall flow morphology in 3D simulations compares well with experimental data and our previous 2D simulations.  However, the flow features in 3D simulations develop earlier than in 2D simulations.  This earlier development better agrees with experimental data.  The effects of artificial viscosity modelling on simulation results are also investigated. Simulations were conducted using the University of New Mexico FIESTA code, which is a gas dynamics code designed for exascale GPU architectures.