2010 Laboratory experiment on wave turbulence

Abstract. This review paper is devoted to a presentation of recent progress in wave turbulence. I first present the context and state of the art of this field of research both experimentally and theoretically. I then focus on the case of wave turbulence on the surface of a fluid, and I discuss the main results obtained by our group: caracterization of the gravity and capillary wave turbulence regimes, the first observation of intermittency in wave turbulence, the occurrence of strong fluctuations of injected power in the fluid, the observation of a pure capillary wave turbulence in low gravity environment and the observation of magnetic wave turbulence on the surface of a ferrofluid. Finally, open questions in wave turbulence are discussed. 1. Context and state of the art. When strong enough surface waves propagate in a medium, their interactions can generate waves of different wavelengths. This energy transfer through the different spatial scales can occur on a wide range of wavelengths. This stationary out-of-equilibrium state is called the wave turbulence: the energy of the system cascades through the scales from a scale where energ