Vortex images and q-elementary functions

Abstract

In the present paper, the problem of vortex images in the annular domain between two coaxial cylinders is solved by the q-elementary functions. We show that all images are determined completely as poles of the q-logarithmic function, and are located at sites of the q-lattice, where a dimensionless parameter q = r 2 2/r 2 1 is given by the square ratio of the cylinder radii. The resulting solution for the complex potential is represented in terms of the Jackson q-exponential function. Our approach in this paper provides an efficient path to rediscover known solutions for the vortex-cylinder pair problem and yields new solutions as well. By composing pairs of q-exponents to the first Jacobi theta function and conformal mapping to a rectangular domain we show that our solution coincides with the known one, obtained before by elliptic functions. The Schottky-Klein prime function for the annular domain is factorized explicitly in terms of q-exponents. The Hamiltonian, the Kirchhoff-Routh and the Green functions are constructed. As a new application of our approach, the uniformly rotating exact N-vortex polygon solutions with the rotation frequency expressed in terms of q-logarithms at Nth roots of unity are found. In particular, we show that a single vortex orbits the cylinders with constant angular velocity, given as the q-harmonic series. Vortex images in two particular geometries with only one cylinder as the q → ∞ limit are studied in detail.