LES OF FLOWS AROUND A CIRCULAR CYLINDER IN THE CRITICAL REYNOLDS NUMBER REGION

Abstract. This paper discusses the applicability of the LES method to flow around a circular cylinder in the critical Reynolds number region. There have been many investigations on the applicability of various numerical models to this situation. However, almost all previous computations have shown an ambiguous decrease in the drag coefficient and an insufficient increase in vortex shedding frequency in comparison with the experiment. Furthermore, the details of the complicated flow structure in the critical region have never been numerically captured. In this research, a sophisticated numerical model is introduced. The flow around a circular cylinder at very high Reynolds number (Re=6x105) is investigated using the LES method, fo-cusing particularly on the complicated flow structure near the flow separation region