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Fig. 3. Stereo-DPIV measurements of the wake of a 16.5 cm BL fish, where
BL is total body length, swimming at 1.2 BL s-1
with free-stream flow subtracted to reveal wake structure. The caudal fin of
the fish was positioned immediately upstream of the wake flow (i.e. to the
left of the vector plot). Vector length indicates flow magnitude; vector color
indicates the magnitude of W (m s-1). The alternating
areas of blue, red and blue vectors visible in the parasagittal plane (A) are
clearly visible as regions of jet flow to the right and left of the fish,
respectively, when viewed from above (B). Note that the lateral component of
jet flow, emphasized here by the small scale of the z-axis for ease
of viewing, is 10-60% greater in magnitude (on average) than that of
U (see Fig. 4A).
Rotating A counterclockwise also shows the alternating pattern of strong
lateral jet flows. Ten vectors from the jet flow of 6-8 strokes for each
individual were sampled to determine U, V and W magnitudes,
where U, V and W are flow velocities in the downstream
(x), vertical (y) and lateral (z) directions,
respectively.