On the spectral solution of the three-dimensional Navier-Stokes equations in spherical and cylindrical regions Original Research Article

This paper investigates the application of spectral methods to the simulation of three-dimensional incompressible viscous flows within spherical or cylindrical boundaries. The Navier-Stokes equations for the primitive variables are considered and a generalized unsteady Stokes problem is derived, using an explicit time discretization of the nonlinear term. A split formulation of the linearized problem is then chosen by introducing a separate Poisson equation for the pressure supplemented by conditions of an integral character which assure that the incompressibility and the velocity boundary condition are simultaneously and exactly satisfied. After expanding the variables in convenient orthogonal bases, these integral conditions assume the form of one-dimensional integrals over the radial variable for the expansion coefficients of pressure, and are shown to involve the modified Bessel functions of half-odd order, in spherical coordinates, and of integer order, in the case of cylindrical regions with periodic boundary conditions along the axis. Such integral conditions represent the counterpart for pressure of the vorticity integral conditions introduced by Dennis for studying plane and axisymmetric flows and reduce the solution of the three-dimensional unsteady Stokes equations within spherical and cylindrical boundaries to a sequence of uncoupled second-order ordinary differential equations for only scalar unknowns.