Convective instability of autocatalytic reaction fronts in vertical cylinders

Convective Instability of Autocatalytic Reaction Fronts in Vertical Cylinders

Dispersion curves in the diffusional instability of autocatalytic reaction fronts.

A (linear) stability analysis of planar reaction fronts to transverse perturbations is considered for systems based on cubic autocatalysis and a model for the chlorite-tetrathionate reaction. Dispersion curves (plots of the growth rate sigma against a transverse wave-number k) are obtained. In both cases it is seen that there is a nonzero value D0 of D (the ratio of the diffusion coefficients o...

Convective fingering of an autocatalytic reaction front.

We report experimental observations of the convection-driven fingering instability of an iodate-arsenous acid chemical reaction front. The front propagated upward in a vertical slab; the thickness of the slab was varied to control the degree of instability. We observed the onset and subsequent nonlinear evolution of the fingers, which were made visible by a pH indicator. We measured the spacing...

Multiplicity of supercritical fronts for reaction-diffusion equations in cylinders

We study multiplicity of the supercritical traveling front solutions for scalar reaction-diffusion equations in infinite cylinders which invade a linearly unstable equilibrium. These equations are known to possess traveling wave solutions connecting an unstable equilibrium to the closest stable equilibrium for all speeds exceeding a critical value. We show that these are, in fact, the only trav...

Convective dynamics of traveling autocatalytic fronts in a modulated gravity field.

When traveling in thin solution layers, autocatalytic chemical fronts may be deformed and accelerated by convective currents that develop because of density and surface tension gradients related to concentration and thermal gradients across the front. On earth, both buoyancy and Marangoni related flows can act in solution layers open to the air while only buoyancy effects operate in covered liq...