On the role of mass diffusion and fluid dynamics in the dissipation of chunk mix

When numerically simulating multicomponent turbulent flows, subgrid-scale diffusion of chemical species requires closure. This mixing of chemical species at the molecular level dissipates concentration uctuations, which limits possible demixing and affects other pro- cesses such as energy transport and reaction rates at the subgrid level. We discuss some of the physical processes that reduce small chunks of a heavy material in a light gas or plasma to a mixture at the atomic level. Preliminary direct numerical simulations of these processes are presented using the dissipation of small spheres of heavy gas in a light gas as an archetypal process in turbulent micromixing in multicomponent ows, including classical uid instabilities and shock ejecta. We use a detailed approach for the diffusion process, directly solving the Stefan-Maxwell equations for the mass fluxes. We discuss the dissipa- tion of a 24 ampersand micro;m sphere of xenon in helium in three different flow regimes, and we present suggestions for future work intended as input to improved subgrid-scale turbulence models