Examination of Kolmogorov's 4/5 Law by High-Resolution Direct Numerical Simulation Data of Turbulence

Kolmogorov's 4/5 law is examined quantitatively by using the data of direct numerical simulations of incompressible turbulence in a periodic box with the number of grid points and the Taylor micro-scale Reynolds number 2048 3 and R λ ≈732, respectively. The examination is based on a generalization of the Kármán–Howarth–Kolmogorov (KHK) equation for isotropic turbulence to anitropic turbulence. An emphasis is put on the influence of the finite Reynolds number, length-scale and the weak but finite anisotropy. The analysis of the DNS data gives a quantitative idea on the role of the viscous and forcing terms in the KHK equation. It also suggests that the anisotropy has substantial influence on the 4/5 law for a wide scale-range.