Similarity solution

In study of partial dierential equations, particularly uid equations then becomes

dynamics, a similarity solution is a form of solution in u
2
which at least one co-ordinate lacks a distinguished ori- t = y u
gin; more physically, it describes a ow which 'looks the
and we may apply scaling arguments to show that
same' either at all times, or at all length scales. These
U
U
include, for example, the Blasius boundary layer or the t y2
[1]
Sedov-Taylor shell.
which gives us the scaling of the y co-ordinate as
y (t)1/2 .
This allows us to pose a self-similar ansatz such that, with
f and dimensionless,
)
(
y
A powerful tool in physics is the concept of dimensional u = U f
(t)1/2
analysis and scaling laws; by looking at the physical effects present in a system we may estimate their size and We have now extracted all of the relevant physics and
hence which, for example, might be neglected. If we have need only solve the equations; for many cases this will
catalogued these eects we will occasionally nd that the need to be done numerically. This equation is
system has not xed a natural lengthscale (timescale), but f /2 = f
that the solution depends on space (time). It is then necessary to construct a lengthscale (timescale) using space with solution satisfying the boundary conditions that
(
(
))
(time) and the other dimensional quantities present - such f = 1 erf(/2) or u = U 1 erf y/(4t)1/2
as the viscosity . These constructs are not 'guessed' but
are derived immediately from the scaling of the govern- which is a self-similar solution of the rst kind.
ing equations.

Concept

3 References
2

Example started plate

The

impulsively

[1] Pringle and King, 2007, Astrophysical Flows, p54

[2] Batchelor (2006 edition), An Introduction to Fluid Dynamics, p189

Consider a semi-innite domain bounded by a rigid wall

and lled with viscous uid.[2] At time t = 0 the wall is
made to move with constant speed U in a xed direction
(for deniteness, say the x direction and consider only the
x y plane). We can see that there is no distinguished
length scale given in the problem, and we have the boundary conditions of no slip
u = U on y = 0
and that the plate has no eect on the uid at innity
u 0 as y .
Now, if we examine the Navier-Stokes equations
)
(
u
+ u u = p + 2 u

t
we can observe that this ow will be rectilinear, with gradients in the y direction and ow in the x direction, and
that the pressure term will have no tangential component
p
= 0 . The x component of the Navier-Stokes
so that
y
1

4 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

4.1

Text

Similarity solution Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Similarity_solution?oldid=705084494 Contributors: Olaf Davis, 7daysahead,

Klbrain, ChrisGualtieri, Wikixenia and Anonymous: 6

4.2

Images

4.3

Content license

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