DSMC Study on Unsteadiness of Supersonic Flow Over a Cylinder

Unsteady flow over a 30 μm diameter cylinder at Mach 4 is investigated using Direct Simulation Monte Carlo across Reynolds numbers from 270 to 6750, spanning slip-flow to near-continuum regimes. Power Spectral Density analysis at discrete probe locations and Dynamic Mode Decomposition of flowfield snapshots independently characterize instabilities in both the stagnation and wake regions. In the stagnation region, a bow shock pulsation mode at 10-15~MHz frequency is identified across all cases despite a 24-fold variation in number density. In the wake, two distinct instabilities are observed. The canonical vortex shedding mode at Strouhal number St ≈ 0.2 dominates at lower Reynolds numbers. A second instability at St ≈ 0.5, consistent with previously reported slipline-driven oscillations in supersonic wakes, emerges at higher Reynolds numbers and progressively strengthens, becoming the dominant mode. In the studied Reynolds range, the wake transitions from no clear unsteadiness, to canonical vortex shedding at St ≈ 0.20, and reaching a regime where the St ≈ 0.5 mode becomes dominant, while also having a distinct independent bow shock pulsation possibly governed by its standoff distance.