Effect of dolphin-inspired transverse wave microgrooves on drag reduction in turbulence

Abstract

The transverse skin of dolphins exhibits a remarkable drag reduction effect. Although previous studies have identified the drag reduction effect of transverse grooves, no clear guidelines exist regarding the impact of groove parameters on turbulent drag reduction. Hence, this paper suggests a novel numerical study using the Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes method to investigate the influence of half-sine wave structure parameters on turbulent drag. The results showed that the aspect ratio of shape parameters significantly affected the drag reduction rate by altering the flow velocity and drag distribution near the wall and increasing the viscous sublayer thickness. Moreover, a novel index friction pressure ratio FPr was introduced to evaluate the drag reduction. It was revealed that the ratio FPr was stable at optimal drag reduction effect regardless of the velocity. By optimizing the FPr, a maximum drag reduction of 29.3% was achieved. These findings provide insight for optimizing transverse groove in drag-reducing surface applications.