Filtered particle tracking in isotropic turbulence and stochastic modeling of subgrid-scale dispersion

A numerical study based on the Eulerian-Lagrangian formulation is performed for dispersed phase motion in a turbulent flow. The effect of spatial filtering, commonly employed in large-eddy simulations, and the role of the subgrid scale turbulence on the statistics of heavy particles, including preferential concentration, are studied through a priori analysis of DNS of particle-laden forced isotropic turbulence. A stochastic Langevin model is proposed to reconstruct the residual (or subgrid scale) fluid velocity along particle trajectories. In simulations where the subgrid scale kinetic energy attains 30–35% of the total we observe the impact of residual fluid motions on particles of a smaller inertia. It is shown that neglecting the influence of subgrid scale fluctuations has a significant effect on the preferential concentration of those particles. The computation results for a selection of particle inertia parameters are performed to appraise the model through comparisons of particle turbulent kinetic energy and the statistics of preferential concentrations.