On the origin of intermittency in wave turbulence

Eric Falcon (1) , Stéphane G. Roux (2) , Claude Laroche (1)

1 MSC - Matière et Systèmes Complexes
2 Phys-ENS - Laboratoire de Physique de l'ENS Lyon

Using standard signal processing tools, we experimentally report that intermittency of wave turbulence on the surface of a fluid occurs even when two typical large-scale coherent structures (gravity wave breakings and bursts of capillary waves on steep gravity waves) are not taken into account. We also show that intermittency depends on the power injected into the waves. The dependence of the power-law exponent of the gravity-wave spectrum on the forcing amplitude cannot be also ascribed to these coherent structures. Statistics of these both events are studied.

Mots clés: wave turbulence; intermittency; structure functions; surface waves on a fluid; coherent structures; wave breaking; capillary bursts; bound waves; experiment; probability density function; fluctuations; Non Gaussian statistics; injected power

Domaines: Dynamique des Fluides [physics.flu-dyn]; Dynamique Chaotique [nlin.CD]; Autre [cond-mat.other]; Mécanique des fluides [physics.class-ph]; Analyse de données, Statistiques et Probabilités [physics.data-an]; Mécanique des fluides [physics.class-ph]

Eric Falcon, Stéphane G. Roux, Claude Laroche. On the origin of intermittency in wave turbulence. EPL - Europhysics Letters, 2010, 90 (3), pp.34005. ⟨10.1209/0295-5075/90/34005⟩. ⟨hal-00480271⟩