  The existence of drag reduction by polymer additives, well established for
wall-bounded turbulent flows, is controversial in homogeneous, isotropic
turbulence. To settle this controversy we carry out a high-resolution direct
numerical simulation (DNS) of decaying, homogeneous, isotropic turbulence with
polymer additives. Our study reveals clear manifestations of
drag-reduction-type phenomena: On the addition of polymers to the turbulent
fluid we obtain a reduction in the energy dissipation rate, a significant
modification of the fluid energy spectrum especially in the deep-dissipation
range, a suppression of small-scale intermittency, and a decrease in
small-scale vorticity filaments.
