This paper has been published as

Jiang, H., Cheng, L., 2017. Strouhal–Reynolds number relationship for flow past a
circular cylinder. Journal of Fluid Mechanics 832, 170–188.
 Strouhal–Reynolds number relationship for flow past a
circular cylinder
HONGYI JIANG1 and LIANG CHENG1,2†
1
School of Civil, Environmental and Mining Engineering, The University of Western Australia, 35
Stirling Highway, Crawley, WA 6009, Australia
2
DUT-UWA Joint Research Centre, State Key Laboratory of Coastal and Offshore Engineering,
Dalian University of Technology, Dalian, 116024, China

Abstract
The Strouhal–Reynolds number (St–Re) relationship for flow past a circular
cylinder in the low Re range of Re ≤ 1000 is investigated through two-dimensional
(2D) and three-dimensional (3D) direct numerical simulations (DNS). An improved
method is proposed for the determination of the separating velocity and the wake
width to allow for a better estimation of the wake Strouhal number St*. For Re in the
extended laminar regime calculated by 2D DNS, the St* values are found to be more
uniform than the original St for the 2D flow. It is also found that the St* values for the
2D and 3D flows agree well in the laminar regime of Re up to approximately 270. In
addition, uniform St* values are also obtained for different Mode A and Mode B flow
structures triggered artificially by using different cylinder span lengths in DNS. It is
demonstrated that the drop in St (with respect to its 2D counterpart) with the
development of different 3D wake structures is due to the decrease in the separating
velocity and the increase in the wake width for a 3D flow, rather than the existence of
a particular wake structure such as pure Mode A or vortex dislocation. However, as
the wake flow becomes increasingly turbulent with further increase in Re, the St*
value for the 3D flow increases gradually and deviates from its 2D counterpart, since
for turbulent 3D flows the vortex shedding frequency scales on a length smaller than
the wake width.

†
Email address for correspondence: liang.cheng@uwa.edu.au

1
1. Introduction
Steady incoming flow past a long smooth circular cylinder at low Reynolds
numbers is one of the most classical fluid mechanics problems. In this case, the flow
is governed by the Reynolds number Re (= UD/ν) only, where U is the incoming flow
velocity, D is the cylinder diameter, and ν is the kinematic viscosity of the fluid. It is
well known that for flow past a circular cylinder vortex shedding emerges at Re = 47
(e.g. Henderson, 1997). The vortex shedding frequency f is commonly presented in a
dimensionless form, namely the Strouhal number St (= fD/U).
The variation of St with Re has been studied extensively, owing to its
fundamental as well as practical significance. For example, Norberg (1994) and Fey et
al. (1998) both reported the St–Re relationship for Re from the onset of vortex
shedding (Re = 47) to the point just before boundary layer transition (Re ~ 2×105).
Fey et al. (1998) also categorized the St–Re curve into different regimes based on
different flow instabilities such as the secondary wake instability at Re ~ 180 and the
shear layer instability at Re ~ 1300. In addition, Schewe (1983) reported the St–Re
relationship for Re from 2×104 to 7×106, covering the range of boundary layer
transition to turbulence.
A number of empirical and semi-empirical formulae for the St–Re relationship
over certain ranges of Re were proposed, for example
1. St = A + B/Re by Roshko (1954) and Ponta and Aref (2004),
2. St = A + B/Re1/2 by Fey et al. (1998), Williamson and Brown (1998) and Ponta
(2006), and
3. St = 1/(A + B/Re) by Roushan and Wu (2005),
where A and B are curve-fitting coefficients. Although some semi-empirical formulae
were established by taking into account physical properties related to vortex shedding,
such as the variation of the shear layer thickness with Re–1/2 (Williamson and Brown,
1998), the transport of vorticity (Ponta and Aref, 2004), or the vortex street structure
(Roushan and Wu, 2005), the formulae were still derived ultimately through curve
fitting of the actual St–Re relationship.

2
 In the low Re range, Williamson (1996a) studied the St–Re relationship in the
wake transition regime, and found two discontinuities in the St–Re curve:
1. A sudden drop of St at the onset of the secondary wake instability of Re ~ 180,
where the fully developed wake flow structure becomes Mode A with large-scale
vortex dislocations.
2. A twin-peaked regime of Re = 230 – 260 where a gradual wake transition from
Mode A with dislocations to Mode B takes place.
Williamson (1996a) suggested that the sudden drop of St at Re ~ 180 is due to the
occurrence of vortex dislocations. In contrast, Henderson (1997) suggested that it is
due to the Mode A instability only, irrespective of the dislocations. Henderson’s (1997)
argument was supported by the three-dimensional (3D) direct numerical simulation
(DNS) of a case at Re = 195 with a restricted spanwise domain length of 3.96D. By
restricting the spanwise domain length to approximately the most unstable wavelength
of Mode A, the fully developed wake structure is represented by one pair of ordered
Mode A structures, while vortex dislocation is suppressed. Nevertheless, as the 3D
wake structure develops the Strouhal number drops from its counterpart calculated by
two-dimensional (2D) DNS. However, the fundamental cause for the variation of St
with the development of different 3D wake structures was not revealed.
Roshko (1955) suggested that the vortex shedding frequency in the wake of a
bluff body would scale better on the velocity at separation (Us) and the wake width
(D′), rather than simply on U and D. The Strouhal number based on such a definition
was called the wake Strouhal number St* (= fD′/Us) in Roshko (1955). Based on
experimental measurements on three bluff-body shapes, including a flat plate, a 90°
wedge, and a circular cylinder, Roshko (1955) obtained a relatively universal St* of
approximately 0.16 (±0.01) for the three bodies for the wake Reynolds number Re* (=
UsD′/ν) in the range of approximately 1×104 to 4.4×104. However, relatively large and
irregular discrepancies of St* ranged between 0.16 and 0.20 were observed for Re*
below approximately 1×104.
By studying the experimental St*–Re data for a circular cylinder, Williamson and
Brown (1998) found a relatively universal St* of approximately 0.176 (with variations
3
between 0.164 and 0.186) for Re in the range of 55 to 1.4×105. Compared with the
results reported in Roshko (1955), the more uniform St* values in the low Re range in
Williamson and Brown (1998) may be attributed to an improvement in the quality of
the experimental data, for example through elimination of the “end effect” of the
cylinder (Williamson, 1996a).
In light of the previous works, the present study aims at examining the St*–Re
relationship in the low Re range of Re ≤ 1000 by using both 2D and 3D DNS. For the
rest of the paper, subscripts “2D” and “3D” are used to distinguish the Strouhal
numbers calculated with 2D and 3D DNS, respectively. An advantage of using DNS is
that high-resolution flow properties, such as Us and D′, are available to allow for a
better estimation and a thorough analysis of the 2D and 3D St*–Re relationships. The
physical mechanism for the variation of St with the development of different 3D wake
structures is also investigated.

2. Numerical model

2.1. Numerical method

The present DNS are carried out with OpenFOAM (www.openfoam.org) to solve
the continuity and incompressible Navier-Stokes equations:

ui
0 (2.1)
xi

ui u 1 p  2ui
 uj i    (2.2)
t x j  xi x j x j

where ( x1 , x2 , x3 )  ( x, y, z) are Cartesian coordinates, ui is the velocity component in

the direction xi, t is time, ρ is fluid density, and p is pressure. The same numerical
approach as used in Jiang et al. (2016, 2017a,b) is adopted here. Specifically, the
Finite Volume Method (FVM) and the Pressure Implicit with Splitting of Operators
(PISO) algorithm (Issa, 1986) are used to solve the equations.

4
2.2. Computational domain and mesh
In the present study, DNS are carried out for Re up to 1000. For Re ≤ 300, the
standard 2D and 3D meshes used in Jiang et al. (2016) are adopted. For 300 < Re ≤
1000, a refined mesh over that used in Jiang et al. (2016) is used. Some key
parameters for the standard and refined meshes are listed in Table 1. Fig. 1 shows a
schematic model and a close-up view of the refined mesh. A relatively high mesh
resolution is used in the near wake by specifying a streamwise mesh size varying
linearly from 0.0375D at x/D = 2 to 0.1D at x/D = 10.

Table 1. Parameters for the standard and refined meshes used in this study.

Parameter Standard mesh Refined mesh (for

(for Re ≤ 300) 300 < Re ≤ 1000)
Distance from the cylinder centre to the inlet 20D 30D
Distance from the cylinder centre to the crossflow 20D 30D
boundaries
Distance from the cylinder centre to the outlet 30D 30D
Number of nodes around the cylinder perimeter 132 240
Height of the first layer of mesh next to the cylinder 1×10-3D 2.315×10-4D
Cell expansion ratio in the domain ≤ 1.1 ≤ 1.1
Spanwise domain length for the 3D mesh 12D 6D
Spanwise cell length for the 3D mesh 0.1D 0.05D

A mesh convergence check of the refined 2D and 3D meshes is reported in

Appendix A. In particular, a reduction in the spanwise domain length from 12D to 6D
is justified, given that the relatively large-scale Mode A structure (with a spanwise
wavelength of ~ 4D) disappears at Re ~ 270 and the small-scale Mode B structure
(with a spanwise wavelength of < 1D) becomes the only wake flow mode for Re >
270. In addition, the spanwise cell length is reduced from 0.1D to 0.05D, since the
Mode B structure becomes finer with further increase in Re.

5
 (a) 6D

30D 30D

z
30D
Inlet x Outlet
D

y
30D

(b)

Fig. 1. The refined mesh used for 300 < Re ≤ 1000: (a) Schematic model of the
computational domain, and (b) Close-up view of the mesh near the cylinder.

3. Determination of St*2D

3.1. Previous method

The wake Strouhal number St*, as proposed by Roshko (1955), is calculated in
the present study by:

6
 U D
St*  f L D / U s  St (3.1)
Us D

where fL is the frequency of the fluctuating lift force. It was shown in Roshko (1955)
and Williamson and Brown (1998) that St* would be nearly constant over a wide
range of Re. In both studies, Us was calculated by:
Us
 1  C pb (3.2)
U
where Cpb is the base pressure coefficient defined in equation (A.5), which is a
negative value. The wake width D′ calculated in Williamson and Brown (1998) was
defined as:
D 2
 1 (3.3)
D D
where δ is the separated shear layer thickness evaluated based on the time-averaged
streamwise velocity profile sampled at the streamwise location of x/D = 1 (refer to
Williamson and Brown (1998) for details).
As shown in Fig. 2, by adopting the method of Williamson and Brown (1998), the
St*2D values for Re in the extended laminar regime up to Re = 1000 are indeed more
uniform than the original St2D values. However, based on the Cpb values calculated in
the present DNS, it is found that equation (3.2) overpredicts Us for Re larger than
approximately 200, as the predicted Us becomes increasingly larger than the
maximum velocity of the whole flow field (Fig. 3(a)). In addition, the wake width
calculated by equation (3.3) (Fig. 3(b)) is based on the streamwise velocity profile
measured at a fixed streamwise location of x/D = 1, whereas for 2D flows the
streamwise length of the recirculation region reduces monotonically with increasing
Re and the vortices may roll up well before x/D = 1 (see Fig. 7(a) for an example at Re
= 1000), such that the wake width measured at x/D = 1 may not represent the actual
wake width that initiates the vortex rolling up and shedding. Nevertheless, for Re
larger than approximately 200, the over-predictions of both Us and D′ by using
equations (3.2) and (3.3) do not necessarily lead to an inaccurate prediction of St*2D,
since the over-predictions of Us and D′ are incidentally at a similar level and thus
cancel out in equation (3.1).

7
 0.24

0.22

0.20

0.18
St

0.16 St2D
St*2D (Present method)
St*2D (Method by Williamson and Brown, 1998)
0.14 St3D
St*3D (Present method)
St*3D (Method by Williamson and Brown, 1998)
0.12
0 200 400 600 800 1000
Re

Fig. 2. 2D and 3D St–Re relationships for flow past a circular cylinder.

(a) 1.7

1.6

1.5
Us /U

1.4

1.3
2D, Equation (3.2)
2D, Maximum velocity in the flow field
1.2 2D, ux, max at x/D = 0 (Present method)
3D, ux, max at x/D = 0 (Present method)
1.1
0 200 400 600 800 1000
Re

8
(b) 1.6

2D, Equation (3.3)

1.5
2D, Present method
2D, Equation (3.3), where
1.4 x/D is based on the present method
3D, Present method
D' /D

1.3

1.2

1.1

1.0
0 200 400 600 800 1000
Re

Fig. 3. (a) Us–Re relationships, and (b) D′–Re relationships, evaluated based on
different methods.

3.2. An improved method

In the present study, an improved method is proposed for the determination of Us
and D′. It is important to note that the Us value should be considered as a velocity
representative of the regional flow field near the separation, rather than the velocity at
a particular point. This is because the velocity profile still develops as the flow travels
from the separation point to the point where vortices start to roll up, and the vortex
shedding frequency is affected by the velocity at the latter point. In this study, Us is
chosen as the peak value (ux,max) along the time-averaged streamwise velocity (ux)
profile at x/D = 0, as denoted by a solid dot in Fig. 4(a). The reason for the choice of
Us is illustrated in Fig. 4(b) with the ux profile for Re = 100 as an example. In Fig.
4(b), the shear layer vorticity thickness δω is calculated as (Monkewitz, 1988):
u x ,max
  (3.4)
dux / dy max

The separated shear layer thickness δ is calculated as δ = δω/2 (Williamson and Brown,
1998), and the streamwise velocity at point B, namely the midpoint of line AC, is
ux,max/2. As shown in Fig. 4(b), line AB serves as a good approximation of the ux
profile along the separating shear layer, and therefore ux,max/4 is considered to be a

9
good approximation of the mean streamwise velocity within the shear layer. In the
present study, Us is chosen as ux,max rather than as ux,max/2 or ux,max/4 so as to facilitate
comparison with the results of Williamson and Brown (1998). The Us–Re relationship
based on the present method is plotted in Fig. 3(a).

(a) 1.50

Re = 50
1.25 Re = 100
Re = 200
Re = 400
Re = 1000
y/D

1.00 Peak value along the profile

0.75

0.50
0.0 0.4 0.8 1.2 1.6
ux /U

(b) 0.9

ux profile for Re = 100

0.8 Approximation of the ux profile

ux = ux, max = Us
y/D

0.7

ux = ux, max /2 C
0.6

B
 =  /2
A
0.5
0.0 0.4 0.8 1.2 1.6
ux /U

Fig. 4. Time-averaged streamwise velocity profiles sampled at x/D = 0: (a) for various
Re values, and (b) for Re = 100.

On the other hand, the D′ value in the present study is determined directly based
on the spanwise vorticity contours of the time-averaged flow field. The spanwise
vorticity ωz is defined in a non-dimensional form:

10
  u y u x  D
z     (3.5)
 x y  U

As illustrated in Fig. 5, D′ is chosen as the largest vertical distance between the

positive and negative ωz peaks. The D′–Re relationship based on the present method is
plotted in Fig. 3(b).
It is also worth noting that, if the time-averaged streamwise velocity profile
sampled at the streamwise location of the largest vertical distance between the
positive and negative ωz peaks, rather than fixed at x/D = 1 as suggested by
Williamson and Brown (1998), is used in equation (3.3) for the determination of D′,
the D′ value would be within 3% of that determined based on the spanwise vorticity
field (Fig. 3(b)). This suggests that the major improvement of the present method over
equation (3.3) is in the choice of the streamwise location for the determination of D′.
This streamwise location should be upstream of the location where vortices start to
roll up. In addition, the present method uses the spanwise vorticity field instead of the
streamwise velocity profile to evaluate D′. This is because the spanwise vorticity field
(e.g. Fig. 5) reveals directly the vertical extent for the vortices to roll up to trigger
vortex shedding, while in equation (3.3) the separated shear layer thickness is
evaluated indirectly based on a linear approximation of the streamwise velocity
profile.

11
Fig. 5. Determination of D′ based on the spanwise vorticity contours of the
time-averaged 2D flow field at Re = 200.

The St*2D–Re relationship based on the present Us and D′ results is also plotted in
Fig. 2, where the St*2D values are found to be more uniform than the St2D values.
However, it is worth noting that the St*2D values are still not completely uniform. This
is because although the vortex shedding frequency scales primarily on Us and D′, it
may still be influenced by other secondary factors such as the redistribution of the
velocity profile in the near wake. This is not explored further in this study. The rest of
the paper will focus on the comparison of 2D and 3D vortex shedding frequencies.

4. Determination of St*3D

4.1. The St*3D–Re relationship

The method proposed in section 3.2 is extended for the study of the 3D flows.
Since the 3D flow beyond the secondary wake instability may not be regular periodic
with the evolution in time, at least 1000 non-dimensional time units of the fully
developed flow have been used for the calculation of the time-averaged flow. By
further averaging the time-averaged flow along the spanwise direction, a 2D flow

12
field is obtained and is then used for the determination of Us and D′ (the results are
also shown in Fig. 3).
As reported in Williamson (1996a), in the mode swapping regime of
approximately Re = 230 – 260, two different St3D values exist for each Re, i.e. a lower
St3D for Mode A with dislocations and a higher St3D for Mode B. In the present study,
however, as the time-averaged flow is considered, the original St3D is calculated based
on the time-averaged frequency of the fluctuating lift force, rather than through the
fast Fourier transform (FFT) analysis of the lift force time-history, such that only one
time-averaged St3D value is obtained for each Re (Fig. 2).
As shown in Fig. 2, for the laminar regime of Re up to approximately 270, St*3D
matches St*2D very well. However, as the wake flow becomes increasingly turbulent
with further increase in Re, St*3D increases gradually and deviates from the
corresponding St*2D value. This suggests that for turbulent flows the vortex shedding
frequency no longer scales on Us and D′.

4.2. Physical mechanism for the deviation between St*3D and St*2D
As summarized in Williamson (1996b), for the range of Re from the onset of
wake turbulence at Re ~ 270 to the onset of shear layer instability at Re ~ 1200, the
Mode B structure in the near wake becomes increasingly disordered, which results in
a reduction in the 2D Reynolds stresses in the near wake, a consistent reduction in the
base pressure, and an increase in the formation length (Lf) as shown in Fig. 6. These
variations are also consistent with the reduction in Us and the increase in D′ for Re =
270 – 1000 shown in Fig. 3.

13
 3.0

Wake stagnation
2.5 point

2.0 Lf
Lf /D

1.5

1.0 2D DNS
3D DNS
Experimental (Noca et al., 1998)
0.5
0 200 400 600 800 1000
Re

Fig. 6. 2D and 3D Lf–Re relationships for flow past a circular cylinder.

The physical mechanism for the deviation between St*3D and St*2D is examined at
Re = 1000. Fig. 7 shows the instantaneous ωz contours of the 2D and 3D (averaged
over the span) flows at Re = 1000, at the time instant that the maximum ux at x/D = 0
is the largest on the upper side of the cylinder and the smallest on the lower side of the
cylinder, namely at the instant when ux on the lower side of the cylinder starts to
increase. At this point, a positive vortex has just been shed from the lower shear layer,
and the lower shear layer is about to roll up to form a new vortex. As shown in Fig.
7(a), the shedding of the positive vortex in the 2D flow is to a great extent influenced
by the rolling up of the negative vortex from the opposite side of the cylinder. For the
3D flow, however, as the recirculation region is much longer (as indicated by the
wake stagnation point in Fig. 7), the lower separating shear layer becomes longer and
thus weaker at the point of shedding (Fig. 7(b)). Therefore, the positive vortex in the
3D flow is shed more independently, at a point that the negative vortex from the
opposite side of the cylinder is still relatively far away from the lower shear layer. In
other words, the crossflow distance for the negative vortex to roll up to trigger the
shedding of the positive vortex is reduced. Consequently, the vortex shedding
frequency of the 3D flow would scale on a length smaller than that for the 2D flow.
When D′ is used for the determination of both St*2D and St*3D, St*3D would be larger

14
than St*2D, as is manifested in Fig. 2.
Generally, the deviation between St*3D and St*2D is observed at Re > 300 (Fig. 2),
for which the increasing deviation between formation lengths calculated by 2D and
3D DNS (Fig. 6) gradually becomes a third major factor influencing the vortex
shedding frequency.

(a)

(b)

Fig. 7. Instantaneous ωz contours for flow past a circular cylinder at Re = 1000: (a) the
2D flow, and (b) the 3D flow (averaged over the span). The wake stagnation point
obtained from the time-averaged flow field is marked by a solid dot.

15
5. Strouhal numbers for Modes A and B
For the laminar regime, which includes Mode A and the onset of Mode B, an
agreement of St*3D and St*2D is observed in Fig. 2, while the difference in the St3D and
St2D values is attributed to the different Us and D′ values used for the 2D and 3D flows
to transform St* into the corresponding St. This suggests that the drop of St3D from its
St2D counterpart is also due to the decrease in Us and the increase in D′ for a 3D flow
(Fig. 3).
The decrease in Us in a 3D flow is related to the spanwise energy amplification of
the shear layers. The decrease in Us also results in a thicker shear layer and thus an
increase in D′. Therefore, similar variation trends for the degree of deviation between
St3D and St2D and the flow three-dimensionality are observed (Fig. 8). The deviation
between St3D and St2D is calculated as:

St  (St2D  St3D ) / St2D 100% (5.1)

The flow three-dimensionality is represented by the statistically stationary spanwise

kinetic energy Ez integrated over the near-wake region of x/D = 0 – 10, where Ez is
defined as:
1
 
2

2 V
Ez  u z / U dV (5.2)

where V is the volume of the flow field of interest.

8
2.0

6 1.5
St (%)

4 1.0
Ez

St
Ez
2 0.5

Mode swapping regime

0 0.0
190 210 230 250 270
Re

16
Fig. 8. Variation trends for the degree of deviation between St3D and St2D (∆St) and the
flow three-dimensionality (represented by Ez).

The Strouhal number for the Mode A flow is further studied at Re = 200 through
varying the cylinder span length Lz to obtain different Mode A flow structures. The
variation of St with Lz is shown in Fig. 9. The flow is 2D for Lz/D ≤ 3 but becomes
unstable to Mode A instability for Lz/D ≥ 3.5, which is consistent with the neutral
instability curve for Mode A proposed by Barkley and Henderson (1996). Fig. 10
shows some typical Mode A wake flow structures in the fully developed state,
identified by the iso-surfaces of the streamwise vorticity ωx:

 u z u y  D
x     (5.3)
 y z  U

For Lz/D ≥ 12, the fully developed flow is represented by Mode A with large-scale
vortex dislocations (e.g. Fig. 10(c)), which is consistent with the experimental results
(e.g. Williamson, 1996a). In contrast, for Lz comparable to the most unstable spanwise
wavelength of Mode A of λA = 3.865D at Re = 200, the fully developed flow is
represented by one pair of ordered Mode A structures (e.g. Fig. 10(a,b)), while vortex
dislocation is suppressed due to the confinement of a short span length (Henderson,
1997).

0.200
2D
0.195 St
One pair of St*
0.190 relatively ordered Mode A

0.185
St

0.180 Mode A with large-scale

vortex dislocations

0.175

0.170
0 4 8 12 16 20 24
Lz /D

17
Fig. 9. Variation of St with Lz for the Mode A flow at Re = 200.

(a) (c)

(b)

Fig. 10. Mode A wake flow structures in the fully developed state at Re = 200: (a)
with Lz/D = 3.5, (b) with Lz/D = 3.865, and (c) with Lz/D = 24. The wake structures
are captured by the iso-surfaces of ωx = ±0.5. Dark grey and light yellow denote
positive and negative values, respectively. The flow is from the left to the right past
the cylinder on the left.

Based on the observation of an obvious drop of St3D with the development of

ordered Mode A structures under the restriction of Lz = λA at Re = 195, Henderson
(1997) suggested that the drop of St3D is due to the existence of the pure Mode A
structure rather than vortex dislocation. This is consistent with the present results at
Re = 200 shown in Fig. 9 and Fig. 10 where the St3D value for Lz = λA = 3.865D (with
pure Mode A) is very close to those for Lz ≥ 12D (with dislocations). However, for the
pure Mode A flow calculated with Lz = 3.5D (Fig. 10(a)), the St3D value is not in line
18
with those for Lz = 3.865D or Lz ≥ 12D. This cannot be explained by Henderson’s
(1997) argument.
As shown in Fig. 9, although the vortex structures and St may be different for the
cases with different Lz, the St* values are quite uniform. This suggests that the drop of
St3D is largely due to the decrease in Us and the increase in D′ for a 3D flow, rather
than the existence of a particular wake structure such as pure Mode A or vortex
dislocation.
The same mechanism also holds for the Strouhal number for the Mode B flow.
The Mode B flow is analysed at Re = 300 rather than at the onset of wake turbulence
of Re = 270 because at Re = 300 an obvious drop of St3D is observed while the
deviation between St*3D and St*2D is still negligibly small (Fig. 2). Fig. 11 shows the
variation of St with Lz for the Mode B flow at Re = 300. The wake flow is represented
by one or two pairs of ordered Mode B structures at small Lz (e.g. Fig. 12(a–c)) but
becomes disordered at large Lz (e.g. Fig. 12(d)). Similar to the results of the Mode A
flow shown in Fig. 9, the St* values shown in Fig. 11 for the Mode B flow are also
quite uniform, regardless of the different vortex structures and St values under
different Lz.

0.215
0.211
2D
0.210 St
0.210
St*
0.209

0.208
0 1 2
0.205
St

Disordered One pair of

Mode B Two pairs of
0.200 ordered Mode B
ordered Mode B
0.175

0.170
0 4 8 12 16 20 24
Lz /D

Fig. 11. Variation of St with Lz for the Mode B flow at Re = 300.

19
(a) (d)

(b)

(c)

Fig. 12. Mode B wake flow structures in the fully developed state at Re = 300: (a)
with Lz/D = 0.65, (b) with Lz/D = 0.825, (c) with Lz/D = 1.65, and (d) with Lz/D = 24.
The wake structures are captured by the iso-surfaces of ωx = ±0.5. Dark grey and light
yellow denote positive and negative values, respectively. The flow is from the left to
the right past the cylinder on the left.

6. Conclusions
This paper examines both the 2D and 3D St–Re relationships for flow past a
circular cylinder in the low Re range of Re ≤ 1000 through DNS. An improved
method is proposed for the determination of the separating velocity Us and the wake
width D′ to allow for a better estimation of the wake Strouhal number St*.
Based on 2D DNS, it is found that the St*2D values for Re in the extended laminar
regime are more uniform than the original St2D values, since the 2D vortex shedding
frequency scales primarily on Us and D′. Based on 3D DNS, it is found that St*3D
matches St*2D well for the laminar regime of Re up to approximately 270. However,

20
as the wake flow becomes increasingly turbulent with further increase in Re, St*3D
increases gradually and deviates from the corresponding St*2D value. This is because
the increase in the streamwise length of the recirculation region results in a weaker
separating shear layer at the point of vortex shedding, such that vortex shedding is
less influenced by the rolling up of the vortex from the opposite side of the cylinder.
Owing to a reduced crossflow distance for the vortex from the opposite side of the
cylinder to roll up to trigger vortex shedding, the vortex shedding frequency scales on
a length that is smaller than D′.
For both the Mode A and Mode B flows in the laminar regime, in addition to the
agreement of St*2D and St*3D by using a relatively large cylinder span length of Lz =
12D, uniform St* values are also obtained by using different Lz, regardless of the
different wake structures and St due to the restriction of Lz. This suggests that the drop
of St3D from St2D with the development of different 3D wake structures is due to the
decrease in the separating velocity and the increase in the wake width for a 3D flow,
rather than the existence of a particular wake structure such as pure Mode A or vortex
dislocation.

Acknowledgments
The corresponding author would like to acknowledge the support from the
National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant ID 51479025) and the authors
would like to acknowledge the Pawsey Supercomputing Centre for providing the
computing resources with funding from the Australian Government and the
Government of Western Australia.

Appendix A. Mesh convergence

The time step ∆t adopted for each case is based on the criterion that the maximum
Courant number (Comax) in the computational domain is kept below 0.4. The Courant
number for a cell is defined as:

Co  u t / l (A.1)

21
where |u| is the magnitude of the velocity through a cell, and ∆l is the cell size in the
direction of the velocity.
A mesh dependence study on the refined 2D mesh is carried out at Re = 1000 (the
largest Re adopted in this study) with three variations:
(1) Increase in the domain size. The distance from the cylinder centre to each side of
the domain is increased from 30D to 60D.
(2) Increase in the mesh resolution. The number of cells in both x- and y-directions is
doubled. In particular, the number of nodes around the cylinder surface is doubled
from 240 to 480, and the height of the first layer of mesh next to the cylinder
surface is halved from 2.315×10-4D to 1.174×10-4D.
(3) Decrease in the time step size. The time step size is reduced to 20% of that before
through keeping Comax below 0.08.
The mesh convergence is checked by examining the variations in the
hydrodynamic forces on the cylinder. The hydrodynamic forces, including the drag
and lift force coefficients (CD and CL), the Strouhal number (St), and the base pressure
coefficient (Cpb), are defined as follows:

CD  FD / (  DU 2 Lz / 2) (A.2)

CL  FL / (  DU 2 Lz / 2) (A.3)

St  f L D / U (A.4)

C pb  ( pb  p ) / ( U 2 / 2) (A.5)

where FD and FL are the integrated drag force and lift force on the cylinder,
respectively, Lz is the spanwise domain length, fL is the frequency of the fluctuating
lift force, pb is the time-averaged pressure at the rear stagnation point of the cylinder,
and p∞ is the reference pressure at the inlet of the domain. The time-averaged drag

and lift coefficients are denoted as CD and CL , respectively. The root-mean-square

lift coefficient CL is defined as:

 C 
N
1
CL 
2
L ,i  CL (A.6)
N i 1

22
where N is the number of values in the time-history of CL.
The results of the 2D mesh dependence study are listed in Table 2. With respect to
the reference case with the refined 2D mesh, the largest variations in the
hydrodynamic forces for the three variation cases are approximately 1%. In addition,

the St and CD values calculated with the refined 2D mesh are very close to those

calculated by Henderson (1997). The above results suggest that the refined 2D mesh
is adequate for the present study with Re ≤ 1000.

Table 2. Results of the 2D mesh dependence study at Re = 1000.

Case description St CD C L –Cpb

Refined 2D mesh (reference case) 0.2377 1.513 1.031 1.734

Increase in the domain size 0.2374 1.505 1.029 1.718
Increase in the mesh resolution 0.2390 1.521 1.042 1.752
Decrease in the time step size 0.2380 1.514 1.036 1.735
Henderson (1997), DNS 0.237 1.505

The 3D mesh dependence study focuses on the mesh resolution and domain size
in the spanwise direction. The reference case for the 3D mesh dependence study is the
refined 3D mesh, which is formed by replicating the refined 2D mesh along the z-axis
with Lz/D = 6 and a uniform spanwise cell length of ∆z/D = 0.05. Table 3 lists the
numerical cases and results for the 3D mesh dependence study at Re = 1000. At least
800 non-dimensional time units (defined as t* = Ut/D) of the fully developed flow are
used to calculate the statistical stationary hydrodynamic forces on the cylinder. The St
value for the 3D flow is determined using the peak frequency derived from the FFT of
the time-history of the lift coefficient.

23
Table 3. Results of the 3D mesh dependence study at Re = 1000.

No. Case description Lz/D ∆z/D St CD C L –Cpb

1 Refined 3D mesh (reference case) 6 0.05 0.2105 1.0138 0.1191 0.8373

2 Increase in Lz 12 0.05 0.2098 1.0104 0.1063 0.8320
3 Decrease in ∆z 6 0.03 0.2106 1.0002 0.0998 0.8148
4 Increase in ∆z 6 0.0706 0.2111 1.0420 0.1597 0.8759
5 Further increase in ∆z 6 0.1 0.2125 1.0467 0.1624 0.8836
Papaioannou et al. (2006), DNS 3π 0.147 0.216 1.030 0.815
Tong et al. (2015), DNS 10 0.1 0.215 1.08 0.20 0.89
Williamson and Brown (1998), exp. 0.212
Norberg (1994), exp. 0.210 0.810

With respect to the reference case (Case 1) in Table 3, Case 2 is designed to

examine the adequacy of Lz. It is found that an Lz of 6D is sufficient for the simulation
at Re = 1000, since an increase in Lz to 12D results in very close numerical results.

Note that CL may decrease to a small extent, since with increasing Lz the integrated

lift coefficient is more likely to be cancelled out by the phase differences along the
span (Henderson, 1997). On the other hand, Cases 3 – 5 are designed to examine the
influence of ∆z. Relatively small variations of the hydrodynamic forces are observed
when ∆z decreases from 0.1D to 0.0706D (Case 5 to Case 4) and from 0.05D to 0.03D
(Case 1 to Case 3), whereas more dramatic variations of the hydrodynamic forces are
observed when ∆z decreases from 0.0706D to 0.05D (Case 4 to Case 1). As a
compromise between numerical accuracy and computational cost, the reference case
with ∆z/D = 0.05 (Case 1 in Table 3) is adopted for the 3D simulations in this study
for Re = 400 – 1000. It is also seen in Table 3 that the hydrodynamic forces predicted
with the reference case are in close agreement with the experimental results reported
in Williamson and Brown (1998) and Norberg (1994).
While it was demonstrated in Jiang et al. (2016) that the standard 3D mesh with
∆z/D = 0.1 is adequate for Re ≤ 300, the cases listed in Table 3 suggest that at least

24
∆z/D = 0.05 is required for Re = 1000. As shown in Fig. 13, this is because the
streamwise vortices of Mode B become finer with increasing Re, and therefore a finer
mesh resolution in the spanwise direction, namely a smaller ∆z, is required to resolve

the finer Mode B structures. The decrease of the CD , CL and –Cpb values as ∆z/D

decreases from 0.0706D to 0.05D (Table 3) is also due to a refined resolution of the
Mode B structures and consequently an increase in the flow three-dimensionality.
Consistently, for the DNS results reported in Tong et al. (2015) by using a very similar
numerical formulation to that adopted in the present study, the use of ∆z/D = 0.1 for

Re = 1000 resulted in over-predicted CD , CL and –Cpb values (Table 3).

Fig. 13. Iso-surfaces of ωx for the fully developed Mode B structures at (a) Re = 300

25
with the standard 3D mesh (Lz/D = 12 and ∆z/D = 0.1), and (b) Re = 1000 with the
refined 3D mesh (Lz/D = 6 and ∆z/D = 0.05). Dark grey and light yellow denote
positive and negative values, respectively. The flow is from the left to the right past
the cylinder on the left.

By using the refined 3D mesh as a replacement for the standard 3D mesh for Re >
300, the number of spanwise mesh layers per unit span length is doubled. This was
the incentive for the use of a halved Lz of 6D for the refined 3D mesh so as to keep the
computational cost at an affordable level. For Re < 270, due to the existence of the
relatively large-scale Mode A structure (with a spanwise wavelength of ~ 4D) and the
associated vortex dislocation, Lz > 10D is necessary for the prediction of converged
numerical results (Jiang et al., 2017c). With further increase in Re, the small-scale
Mode B structure (with a spanwise wavelength of < 1D) becomes the only wake flow
mode, which offers theoretical support for the use of a reduced Lz. This is
demonstrated with the 3D mesh dependence study at Re = 400. As shown in Table 4,
similar numerical results are obtained when Lz/D reduces from 12 to 6 (Case 3 to Case
2 in Table 4). In addition, it is found that the numerical results at Re = 400 (Case 2 to
Case 1 in Table 4) are less sensitive to the decrease in ∆z/D from 0.1 to 0.05 than
those at Re = 1000 (Case 5 to Case 1 in Table 3), which suggests that ∆z/D = 0.05
should also be sufficient for Re = 400. Hence, in the present study, the refined 3D
mesh with Lz/D = 6 and ∆z/D = 0.05 is adopted for the range of Re = 400 – 1000 for
consistency.

Table 4. Results of the 3D mesh dependence study at Re = 400.

No. Case description Lz/D ∆z/D St CD C L –Cpb

1 Refined 3D mesh 6 0.05 0.2039 1.1960 0.3355 0.9674

2 Increase in ∆z 6 0.1 0.2049 1.2187 0.3793 1.0020
3 Increase in both Lz and ∆z 12 0.1 0.2045 1.2109 0.3594 0.9898

26
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