Stability of the collisional plasma flow in a magnetic field

A collisional plasma flow moving along a magnetic field at a velocity lower than the speed of sound is considered. It has been found that stationary small perturbations increase downstream in the flow. The mechanism of the increase is related to the fact that subsonic ideal-plasma flows respond to external perturbations primarily by a change in the pressure of the plasma. As a result, the pressure under perturbation of the velocity changes so that the stationary flow is decelerated and accelerated if the force is directed along and against the velocity, respectively. This phenomenon can be explained under the assumption that the effective mass of the plasma is negative. If the velocity of the flow is inhomogeneous in the transverse direction, the viscosity force plays a role of the external perturbing force. In this case, the effective transverse viscosity coefficient, which should be treated as negative, can be renormalized instead of the effective mass. The sign of the effective specific heat or the effective transverse thermal conductivity coefficient changes similarly if the velocity of the flow is lower than the speed of sound but is higher than the thermal velocity of ions calculated from the sum of the ion and electron temperatures. A downstream increase in the stationary perturbations is called in this work spatial instability. The downstream growth rate has been determined. The numerical analysis of the evolution of perturbations illustrates the development of the spatial instability of subsonic collisional plasma flows moving along the magnetic field.     

Stabilization of solitons generated by a supersonic flow of Bose-Einstein condensate past an obstacle

The stability of dark solitons generated by supersonic flow of a Bose-Einstein condensate past an obstacle is investigated. It is shown that in the reference frame attached to the obstacle a transition occurs at some critical value of the flow velocity from absolute instability of dark solitons to their convective instability. This leads to the decay of disturbances of solitons at a fixed distance from the obstacle and the formation of effectively stable dark solitons. This phenomenon explains the surprising stability of the flow picture that has been observed in numerical simulations.     

Centrifugal instability in rotating shallow water and the problem of the spiral structure in galaxies

A new instability predicte by theory to occur in rotating shallow water in which the rotation velocity has a discontinuity, in a regime where the flow velocity exceeds the characteristics velocity of the waves, has been found experimentally. The instability develops when the radial gradient of the angular velocity across the discontinuity is negative; such an instability is likely to be responsible for the formation of the spiral structure in galaxies which have a similar rotational velocity profile.     

Instability of a charged spherical viscous drop moving relative to a medium

It is shown that, as the velocity of the flow around a charged drop of viscous liquid increases the drop charge value critical for the occurrence of drop instability rapidly decreases. It is found that, for some domains of values of the charge, the ratio of densities of the media, and the ambient velocity, the even and odd modes of the drop capillary oscillations pairwise couple with each other, which represents drop vibrational instability against the tangential discontinuity of the velocity field at the drop surface. At medium velocities larger than those associated with such domains, the instability growth rates for odd modes exceed the increments of even modes with smaller orders, which corresponds to the parachute-like deformation of the drop in the flow.     

Marangoni instability of a heated liquid layer in the presence of a soluble surfactant

We consider the influence of adsorption kinetics on a longwave oscillatory instability in a layer of a binary liquid heated from below. It is shown that an advection of the adsorbed surfactant leads to a strong stabilization of the mode. Qualitative explanation of the numerical results is provided.     

Instability of a charged spherical drop moving relative to a medium

It is shown that the critical self-charge for the onset of instability of a charged drop in a flow of an ideal fluid decreases as the flow velocity of the fluid past the drop increases, i.e., a complex instability arises which is a superposition of the instabilities of the free surface of the drop with respect to the tangential discontinuity of the velocity field at the free surface of the drop and with respect to the self-charge. Zh. Tekh. Fiz. 69, 7–14 (May 1999)     

Anisotropic origin of the bending instability of the flux-antiflux interface in type-II superconductors

The physical nature of the macroturbulence in vortex matter in YBCO superconductors is investigated by means of a magneto-optic study of the instability in a single crystal prepared especially for this purpose. The instability develops near those sample edges where the oppositely directed flow of vortices and antivortices, guided by twin boundaries, is characterized by the discontinuity of the tangential component of the hydrodynamic velocity. This fact indicates that the macroturbulence is analogous to the instability of fluid flow at a surface of a tangential velocity discontinuity in classical hydrodynamics and is related to the anisotropic flux motion in the superconductor.     

Linear wave interaction at the charged fluid-fluid interface under tangential discontinuity of the velocity field

Capillary wave flow in a two-layer fluid with the upper layer moving parallel to the charged interface at a constant velocity is treated within a linear mathematical model. Interaction between waves excited on the free surface of the upper layer and at the interface results not only in classical Kelvin-Helmholtz instability (at low velocities of the upper layer) but also in oscillatory instability of the interface. The instability increment depends on the fluid density ratio, translational velocity, and charge density at the interface.     

Flow separation behind a rib in a channel with laminar flow

Visualization data and results of combined measurements of flow quantities in flow with separation past a rib at nominally laminar regime of channel flow are reported. In the separation region, the flow is found to be essentially three-dimensional and unsteady, exhibiting a distinct cellular structure and flow zones with transverse motion. It is shown that the rib-induced flow separation gives rise to low-frequency fluctuations of flow velocity and initiates the turbulence transition in the channel flow. The critical Reynolds number at which flow instability starts developing in the channel is estimated. It is shown that at Reynolds numbers higher than the critical Reynolds number the linear integral scale of flow velocity fluctuations in the channel is defined by the duct size.     

The instability of the surface of helium crystal in a superfluid flow

The problem on crystal growth under conditions of normal incidence of fluid on the boundary is investigated for stability. The threshold velocity of the emergence of instability is found; at low temperatures, this velocity proves to be much lower than the sound velocity. The stability is examined of the shape of cylindrical crystal in a fluid flow parallel to the crystal axis. The behavior of the atomically rough surface of crystal helium is experimentally investigated in a jet of fluid in the temperature range from 1 to 1.4 K, where the emergence is observed of an instability of the type previously predicted by Kagan, as well as by Nozieres and Uwaha. Observations reveal that, below the roughening transition, the (0001) basal face is stable in a jet of fluid.     

Shear instability in fluids with a density-dependent viscosity

We present a shear instability, which can be triggered in compressible fluids with density-dependent viscosity at shear rates above critical. The instability mechanism is generic: It is based on density-dependent viscosity, compressibility, as well as flow two-(three-)dimensionality that provides coupling between streamwise and transversal velocity components and density variations. The only factor stabilizing the instability is fluid elasticity. The corresponding eigenvalue problem for a plane Couette flow is solved analytically in the limiting cases of large and small wave numbers.     

On the stability of capillary waves on the surface of a space-charged dielectric liquid jet moving in a material medium

We have derived and analyzed the dispersion equation for capillary waves with an arbitrary symmetry (with arbitrary azimuthal numbers) on the surface of a space-charged cylindrical jet of an ideal incompressible dielectric liquid moving relative to an ideal incompressible dielectric medium. It has been proved that the existence of a tangential jump of the velocity field on the jet surface leads to a periodic Kelvin–Helmholtz- type instability at the interface between the media and plays a destabilizing role. The wavenumber ranges of unstable waves and the instability increments depend on the squared velocity of the relative motion and increase with the velocity. With increasing volume charge density, the critical value of the velocity for the emergence of instability decreases. The reduction of the permittivity of the liquid in the jet or an increase in the permittivity of the medium narrows the regions of instability and leads to an increase in the increments. The wavenumber of the most unstable wave increases in accordance with a power law upon an increase in the volume charge density and velocity of the jet. The variations in the permittivities of the jet and the medium produce opposite effects on the wavenumber of the most unstable wave.     

Hydrodynamic instability of premixed flame propagating in narrow planar channel in the presence of gas flow

The paper analyses the hydrodynamic instability of a flame propagating in the space between two parallel plates in the presence of gas flow. The linear analysis was performed in the framework of a two-dimensional model that describes the averaged gas flow in the space between the plates and the perturbations development of two-dimensional combustion wave. The model includes the parametric dependences of the flame front propagation velocity on its local curvature and on the combustible gas velocity averaged along the height of the channel. It is assumed that the viscous gas flow changes the surface area of the flame front and thereby affects the propagation velocity of the two-dimensional combustion wave. In the absence of the influence of the channel walls on the gas flow, the model transforms into the Darrieus–Landau model of flame hydrodynamic instability. The dependences of the instability growth rate on the wave vector of disturbances, the velocity of the unperturbed gas flow, the viscous friction coefficients and other parameters of the problem are obtained. It is shown that the viscous gas flow in the channel can lead, in some cases, to a significant increase in instability compared with a flame propagating in free space. In particular, the instability increment depends on the direction of the gas flow with respect direction of the flame propagation. In the case when the gas flow moves in the opposite direction to the direction of the flame propagation, the pulsating instability can appear.     

Hydrodynamic singularities and clustering in a freely cooling inelastic gas

We employ hydrodynamic equations to follow the clustering instability of a freely cooling dilute gas of inelastically colliding spheres into a well-developed nonlinear regime. We simplify the problem by dealing with a one-dimensional coarse-grained flow. We observe that at a late stage of the instability the shear stress becomes negligibly small, and the gas flows solely by inertia. As a result the flow formally develops a finite-time singularity, as the velocity gradient and the gas density diverge at some location. We argue that flow by inertia represents a generic intermediate asymptotic of unstable free cooling of dilute inelastic gases.     

On the interaction of a sound pulse with the shear layer of an axisymmetric jet

The behavior of a sound pulse from a simulated source in a jet is investigated both experimentally and numerically. Both approaches show that in the low and medium frequencies the far field acoustic power exhibits a marked amplification as the flow velocity increases. Experimentally this changes to an attenuation at the higher frequencies which cannot be computed by the numerical model. This amplification is traced to shear noise terms which trigger the instability waves that are inherent within the flow.     

Chemical instability induced by a shear flow

We predict a new type of instability induced by shear flow in chemical systems. A homogeneous steady state solution of a reaction-diffusion system loses stability in a Poiseuille flow. The instability appears as the speed of the flow increases beyond a certain threshold. This results in a steady pattern moving with the average fluid velocity. The chemical reaction consists of two species (activator and inhibitor) moving with identical velocities. Contrary to Turing's instability, the pattern arises when the activator has a higher diffusivity than the inhibitor.     

Resonant interaction of elastic thin bar vibrations with a shear shallow-water flow

It is demonstrated that resonant interaction of a thin bar with a shear shallow-water flow results in the development of wind instability. The dispersion equation and the instability increment are derived. The wavelength range in which the instability exists is narrowed down when the sound velocity decreases. The frequency and increment of bending waves are estimated numerically for various flow parameters.     

Development of laminar-separating-flow perturbations on a wavy wing

The development of velocity perturbations at laminar boundary-layer separation from a wing with wavy surface has been examined. Experiments were carried out to identify flow features displayed by the spatially periodic flow structure. An analysis of the linear stability of measured velocity profiles is performed. As a result of the analysis, the influence of surface waviness on the frequency range and growth rates of instability waves was investigated, with a good agreement between calculated and experimental data. This work was supported by the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation under the Program “Development of Higher-School Scientific Potential” for the years 2006–2008 (Projects RNP 2.1.1.471 and RNP 2.1.2.3370), and also by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research (Grant No. 07-08-00164).     

PIV and LDV evidence of hydrodynamic instability over a liner in a duct with flow

The acoustical behavior and the flow in a rectangular lined channel with grazing flow have been investigated. The liner consists of a ceramic structure of parallel square channels and is locally reacting. In the absence of flow, the liner has a classical behavior: the acoustic transmission coefficient has a minimum at the resonance frequency of the resonators. When the Mach number of the grazing flow increases, the material behavior becomes unclassical in the sense that its acoustic transmission increases strongly around the resonance frequency. To connect this behavior with flow features, the flow itself in the vicinity of a liner has been measured by means of laser velocimetry. Periodic structures have been observed along the liner that are phase-locked with the incident sound wave. The axial and transverse velocity of these structures bear the typical features of an instability. In particular, the wavelength, convection speed, and growth rate are given. This is the first time that an aeroacoustic instability resulting from the interaction of flow and sound over a liner is measured.