Abstract: Prediction of the characteristics of turbulent flows with strong streamline curvature, such as flows in turbomachines, curved channel flows, flows around airfoils and buildings, is of great importance in engineering applications and poses a very practical challenge for turbulence modeling. In this paper, we analyze qualitatively the curvature effects on the structure of turbulence and conduct numerical simulations of a turbulent U-duct flow with a number of turbulence models in order to assess their overall performance. The models evaluated in this work are some typical linear eddy viscosity turbulence models, nonlinear eddy viscosity turbulence models (NLEVM) (quadratic and cubic), a quadratic explicit algebraic stress model (EASM) and a Reynolds stress model (RSM) developed based on the second-moment closure. Our numerical results show that a cubic NLEVM that performs considerably well in other benchmark turbulent flows, such as the Craft, Launder and Suga model and the Huang and Ma model, is able to capture the major features of the highly curved turbulent U-duct flow, including the damping of turbulence near the convex wall, the enhancement of turbulence near the concave wall, and the subsequent turbulent flow separation. The predictions of the cubic models are quite close to that of the RSM, in relatively good agreement with the experimental data, which suggests that these models may be employed to simulate the turbulent curved flows in engineering applications.

Key words: curvature effect, nonlinear eddy viscosity turbulence model, Reynolds stress model