Vortex

Not to be confused with vertex. For other uses, see Vortex (disambiguation).

Vortex created by the passage of an aircraft wing, revealed by colored smoke

Von Kármán vortex street behind a drinking straw; milk was poured into the water to make the current visible

A Kármán vortex street is shown in this photo, as winds from the west blow onto clouds that have formed over the mountains in the desert. This phenomenon observed from ground level is extremely rare, as most cloud-related Kármán vortex street activity is viewed from space.

In fluid dynamics, a vortex (pl.: vortices or vortexes) is a region in a fluid in which the flow revolves around an axis line, which may be straight or curved. Vortices form in stirred fluids and may be observed in smoke rings, whirlpools in the wake of a boat, and in the winds surrounding a tropical cyclone, tornado, or dust devil.

Vortices are a major component of turbulent flow. The distribution of velocity, vorticity (the curl of the flow velocity), as well as the concept of circulation are used to characterize vortices. In most vortices, the fluid flow velocity is greatest next to its axis and decreases in inverse proportion to the distance from the axis.

In the absence of external forces, viscous friction within the fluid tends to organize the flow into a collection of irrotational vortices, possibly superimposed to larger-scale flows, including larger-scale vortices. Once formed vortices can move, stretch, twist, and interact in complex ways. A moving vortex carries some angular and linear momentum, energy, and mass, with it.