  A recently established mathematical equivalence--between weakly perturbed
Huygens fronts (e.g., flames in weak turbulence or geometrical-optics wave
fronts in slightly nonuniform media) and the inviscid limit of
white-noise-driven Burgers turbulence--motivates theoretical and numerical
estimates of Burgers-turbulence properties for specific types of white-in-time
forcing. Existing mathematical relations between Burgers turbulence and the
statistical mechanics of directed polymers, allowing use of the replica method,
are exploited to obtain systematic upper bounds on the Burgers energy density,
corresponding to the ground-state binding energy of the directed polymer and
the speedup of the Huygens front. The results are complementary to previous
studies of both Burgers turbulence and directed polymers, which have focused on
universal scaling properties instead of forcing-dependent parameters. The
upper-bound formula can be heuristically understood in terms of renormalization
of a different kind from that previously used in combustion models, and also
shows that the burning velocity of an idealized turbulent flame does not
diverge with increasing Reynolds number at fixed turbulence intensity, a
conclusion that applies even to strong turbulence. Numerical simulations of the
one-dimensional inviscid Burgers equation using a Lagrangian finite-element
method confirm that the theoretical upper bounds are sharp within about 15% for
various forcing spectra (corresponding to various two-dimensional random
media). These computations provide a new quantitative test of the replica
method. The inferred nonuniversality (spectrum dependence) of the front speedup
is of direct importance for combustion modeling.
