One contribution of 13 to a Theme Issue 'Turbulent mixing and beyond: non-equilibrium processes from atomistic to astrophysical scales II' . The results of three-dimensional numerical simulations of turbulent flows obtained by various authors are reviewed. The paper considers the turbulent mixing (TM) process caused by the development of the main types of instabilities: those due to gravitation (with either a fixed or an alternating-sign acceleration), shift and shock waves. The problem of a buoyant jet is described as an example of the mixed-type problem. Comparison is made with experimental data on the TM zone width, profiles of density, velocity and turbulent energy and degree of homogeneity.