Transition to three dimensional flow in thermal convection with spanwise rotation

Abstract: We investigate by direct numerical simulation Rayleigh-B\'enard convection in a rotating rectangular cell with rotation vector and gravity perpendicular to each other. The flow is two dimensional near the onset of convection with convection rolls aligned parallel to the rotation axis of the boundaries. At a sufficiently large Rayleigh number, the flow becomes unstable to three dimensional disturbances which changes the scaling of heat transport and kinetic energy with Rayleigh number. The mechanism leading to the instability is identified as an elliptical instability. At the transition, the Reynolds and Rossby numbers $\mathrm{Re}$ and $\mathrm{Ro}$ based on the kinetic energy of the flow are related by $\mathrm{Re} \propto \mathrm{Ro}^{-2}$ at small $\mathrm{Ro}$ with a geometry dependent prefactor.