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Other equations in physics, such as Gauss's law of the electric field and Gauss's law for gravity, have a similar mathematical form to the continuity equation, but are not usually referred to by the term "continuity equation", because j in those cases does not represent the flow of a real physical quantity.
The flow speed of a fluid can be measured using a device such as a Venturi meter or an orifice plate, which can be placed into a pipeline to reduce the diameter of the flow. For a horizontal device, the continuity equation shows that for an incompressible fluid, the reduction in diameter will cause an increase in the fluid flow speed.
An example of flow entering a channel would be a road side gutter. An example of flow leaving a channel would be an irrigation channel. This flow can be described using the continuity equation for continuous unsteady flow requires the consideration of the time effect and includes a time element as a variable.
A flow that is not a function of time is called steady flow. Steady-state flow refers to the condition where the fluid properties at a point in the system do not change over time. Time dependent flow is known as unsteady (also called transient [8]). Whether a particular flow is steady or unsteady, can depend on the chosen frame of reference.
The second equation is the incompressible constraint, stating the flow velocity is a solenoidal field (the order of the equations is not causal, but underlines the fact that the incompressible constraint is not a degenerate form of the continuity equation, but rather of the energy equation, as it will become clear in the following).
In the analysis of a flow, it is often desirable to reduce the number of equations and/or the number of variables. The incompressible Navier–Stokes equation with mass continuity (four equations in four unknowns) can be reduced to a single equation with a single dependent variable in 2D, or one vector equation in 3D.
In fluid dynamics, the Taylor–Green vortex is an unsteady flow of a decaying vortex, which has an exact closed form solution of the incompressible Navier–Stokes equations in Cartesian coordinates. It is named after the British physicist and mathematician Geoffrey Ingram Taylor and his collaborator A. E. Green. [1]
The Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes equations (RANS equations) are time-averaged [a] equations of motion for fluid flow. The idea behind the equations is Reynolds decomposition , whereby an instantaneous quantity is decomposed into its time-averaged and fluctuating quantities, an idea first proposed by Osborne Reynolds . [ 1 ]