Transition to chaos in a confined two-dimensional fluid flow.

For a two-dimensional fluid in a square domain with no-slip walls, new direct numerical simulations reveal that the transition from steady to chaotic flow occurs through a sequence of various periodic and quasiperiodic flows, similar to the well-known Ruelle-Takens-Newhouse scenario. For all solutions beyond the ground state, the phenomenology is dominated by a domain-filling circulation cell, whereas the associated symmetry is reduced from the full symmetry group of the square to rotational symmetry over an angle pi. The results complement both laboratory experiments in containers with rigid walls and numerical simulations on double-periodic domains.