  A simple scheme of forcing turbulence away from decay was introduced by
Lundgren some time ago, the `linear forcing', which amounts to a force term
linear in the velocity field with a constant coefficient. The evolution of
linearly forced turbulence towards a stationary final state, as indicated by
direct numerical simulations (DNS), is examined from a theoretical point of
view based on symmetry arguments. In order to follow closely the DNS the flow
is assumed to live in a cubic domain with periodic boundary conditions. The
simplicity of the linear forcing scheme allows one to re-write the problem as
one of decaying turbulence with a decreasing viscosity. Scaling symmetry
considerations suggest that the system evolves to a stationary state, evolution
that may be understood as the gradual breaking of a larger approximate symmetry
to a smaller exact symmetry. The same arguments show that the finiteness of the
domain is intimately related to the evolution of the system to a stationary
state at late times, as well as the consistency of this state with a high
degree of isotropy imposed by the symmetries of the domain itself. The
fluctuations observed in the DNS for all quantities in the stationary state can
be associated with deviations from isotropy. Indeed, self-preserving isotropic
turbulence models are used to study evolution from a direct dynamical point of
view, emphasizing the naturalness of the Taylor microscale as a self-similarity
scale in this system. In this context the stationary state emerges as a stable
fixed point. Self-preservation seems to be the reason behind a noted similarity
of the third order structure function between the linearly forced and freely
decaying turbulence, where again the finiteness of the domain plays an
significant role.
