Visualizing lagrangian coherent structured and comparison to vector field topology

This paper takes a look at the visualization side of vector field analysis based on Lagrangian coherent structures. The Lagrangian coherent structures are extracted as height ridges of finite-time Lyapunov exponent fields. The resulting visualizations are compared to those from traditional instantaneous vector field topology of steady and unsteady vector fields. The examination is applied to three-dimensional vector fields from a dynamical system and practical CFD simulations.