On the Combined Effects of Turbulence and Gravity on Droplet Collisions in Clouds: A Numerical Study

Abstract

Abstract This paper examines the combined influences of turbulence and gravity on droplet collision statistics in turbulent clouds by means of direct numerical simulation (DNS). The essential microphysical mechanisms that determine the geometric collision kernel are explored by studying how gravity affects droplet relative velocities and preferential concentration of both monodisperse and bidisperse droplet distributions. To this end, collision statistics of large amounts of droplets with radii ranging from 10 to 90 μm, driven by a turbulent flow field and gravity, are calculated. The flow is homogeneous and isotropic and has a dissipation rate of ε = 4.25 × 10−2 m2 s−3. The results show that in the calculation of collision statistics, the interplay between gravity and turbulence is an essential element and not merely an addition of separate phenomena. For example, the presence of gravity leads to clustering of large droplets interacting with the larger scales of turbulence in the DNS. The collision statistics of a bidisperse droplet distribution, even with a very small radius difference, shows profoundly different behavior than the monodisperse case.