Instability of a thermally inhomogeneous layer of weakly conducting liquid in an electric field

We give the results of a theoretical investigation of the hydrostatic stability of a plane horizontal layer of weakly conducting liquid for different constant temperatures and potentials on the thermally and electrically conducting capacitor plates bounding the layer. We found that the onset of electrothermal convection is of an oscillatory nature. The critical conditions for loss of stability were found.Translated from Izvestiya Akademii Nauk SSSR, Mekhanika Zhidkosti i Gaza, No. 6, pp. 133–138, November–December, 1974.     

Electroconvective stability of a weakly conducting liquid

In inhomogeneous electric fields, at sufficiently high field strengths, a weakly conducting liquid becomes unstable and is set in motion [1–4]. The cause of the loss of stability and the motion is the Coulomb force acting on the space charge formed by virtue of the inhomogeneity of the electrical conductivity of the liquid [4–13]. This inhomogeneity may be due to external heating [4–6], a local raising of the temperature by Joule heating [2, 7, 8], and nonlinearity of Ohm's law [9–13]. In the present paper, in the absence of a temperature gradient produced by an external source, a condition is found whose fulfillment ensures that the influence of Joule heating on the stability can be ignored. Under the assumption that this condition is satisfied, a criterion for stability of a weakly conducting liquid between spherical electrodes is obtained.Translated from Izvestiya Akademii Nauk SSSR, Mekhanika Zhidkosti i Gaza, No. 4, pp. 137–142, July–August, 1979.     

Shape of an incompressible,weakly conducting jet in a strong electric field

Translated from Zhurnal Prikladnoi Mekhaniki i Tekhnicheskoi Fiziki, No. 2, pp. 20–25, March–April, 1991.     

Convective stability of a rotating conducting fluid layer in an external magnetic field

The stability of the rest state of a conducting incompressible fluid forming a horizontal layer with rigid dielectric boundaries heated from below and rotating about a vertical axis, with a vertical magnetic field superimposed, is studied in the Boussinesq approximation. With increase in the Rayleigh number, depending on the relationship between the problem parameters (Taylor, Chandrasekhar and kinematic and magnetic Prandtl numbers), the eigenvalue of the critical mode of the linearization operator may be zero or imaginary, so that the instability of the rest state may be monotonic or oscillatory. The effect of the parameter values on the instability mode is investigated. In particular, the parameter ranges on which the critical eigenvalue is zero or imaginary are found.     

Stability of a falling conducting liquid film in an alternating electric field

The flow of a thin viscous conducting liquid film falling along one of the plates of a vertically positioned plane capacitor is studied. The capacitor is connected to an alternating current power supply. It is shown that the presence of the electric field leads to flow destabilization; moreover, the parametric resonance of capillary waves is observed.     

Convective motion of a conducting liquid carrying a current in a transverse magnetic field

The convective instability of a layer of conducting liquid carrying a current and lying in a magnetic field perpendicular to the current is considered. The problem of the nonconductive approximation in a linear setting is solved. The relationships between the Rayleigh number and the Hartmann number (determining the neutral stability) are derived.Translated from Izvestiya Akademii Nauk SSSR, Mekhanika Zhidkosti i Gaza. No. 2, pp. 20–26, March–April, 1971.     

Convective instability of a plane horizontal layer of weakly conducting fluid in alternating and modulated electric fields

The electrothermoconvective instability of a plane horizontal layer of weakly conducting fluid in a modulated vertical electric field is investigated. The analysis is based on the electrohydrodynamic approximation. The stability threshold in the linear approximation is found using Floquet’s theory. The effect of periodic modulation on the fluid behavior is studied in both the presence and the absence of the constant component of the electric field. It is shown that modulation can stabilize the unstable ground state or destabilize fluid equilibrium, depending on the amplitude and frequency. In addition to a synchronous or subharmonic response to an external forcing, the instability may be associated with two-frequency (quasiperiodic) perturbations. The cases of weightlessness and a transversely stratified fluid in a static gravity field are considered. Madrid, Perm’. Translated from Izvestiya Rossiiskoi Akademii Nauk, Mekhanika Zhidkosti i Gaza, No. 3, pp. 31–38, May–June, 2000. The investigations whose results are presented in this paper were supported by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research (project No. 98-01-00507).     

Dynamics of electroconvective structures in a weakly conducting liquid

The finite-amplitude evolution of electroconvective structures in a weakly conducting liquid with an electroconductive charge formation mechanism is examined. The liquid is in the electrostatic field of a horizontally placed capacitor and is heated from below, and the electric charge time constant is much shorter than the characteristic hydrodynamic time. The interaction between the electroconductive convection and thermogravitational convection is considered. The evolution of the supercritical structures is investigated by direct numerical simulation using the finite-difference method. The bifurcations leading to the formation of stationary and wave liquid flows are analyzed. Nonlinear modes of stationary convection and traveling waves with different space-time patterns are identified and investigated. __________ Translated from Prikladnaya Mekhanika i Tekhnicheskaya Fizika, Vol. 49, No. 3, pp. 20–27, May–June, 2008.     

Calculation of the free surface of a conducting liquid in a strong electric field

A study is made of the static shape of a conducting liquid in a strong inhomogeneous electric field at the end of a capillary. Numerical solution of a self-consistent problem is used.Translated from Izvestiya Akademii Nauk SSSR, Mekhanika Zhidkosti i Gaza, No. 6, pp. 165–167, November–December, 1983.     

Forces acting on a weakly conductive dielectric in an electric field

The nature of the forces acting on a weakly conductive liquid dielectric in an electric field will be considered. In the general case there act upon the liquid dielectric a Coulomb force related to space charge and a polarization force [1]. In many studies the motion of a conductive liquid dielectric has been explained by the presence of the polarization force, with the Coulomb force being ignored. In the present study it will be demonstrated that the force related to space charge may be larger than or of the same order as the forces connected with polarization of the medium and, generally speaking, must be considered in describing the equations of motion in concrete cases.Translated from Izvestiya Akademii Nauk SSSR, Mekhanika Zhidkosti i Gaza, No. 1, pp. 155–157, January–February, 1977.     

Flow stability of a conducting liquid flowing down an inclined plane in the presence of a magnetic field

The stability of a steady flow of incompressible, conducting liquid down an inclined plane in the presence of longitudinal and transverse magnetic fields is studied. Solutions of the linearized magnetohydrodynamic equations with corresponding boundary conditions are found on the assumption that the Reynolds number R_g and the wave number are small. It is shown that the longitudinal magnetic field plays a stabilizing role. It is known [1] that the flow of a viscous liquid over a vertical wall is always unstable. In this article it is shown that the instability effect at small wave numbers may be eliminated if the longitudinal magnetic field satisfies the conditions found. The case when the Alfvén number and the wave number are small and the Reynolds number is finite is also examined.     

Convective stability of a liquid in a spherical cavity

Three problems of convertive stability in a spherical liquid layer are considered. They differ with respect to the degree of freedom of the surface: a free, but nondeformable surface (a small droplet on a spider's web will serve as a model), a nonfree deformable surface (a droplet contaminated with an insoluble surface active agent), and a rigid unrestrained shell (dust-covered droplet). The Marangoni effects in the first two problems were investigated by Bratukhin [2] and are disregarded.Translated from Izvestiya Rossiiskoi Akademii Nauk, Mekhanika Zhidkosti i Gaza, No.3, pp. 24–28, May–June, 1992.     

Motion of an incompressible conducting liquid in a strong self-consistent magnetic field

One of the common regimes of operation of many laboratory and industrial magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) devices using liquid metals as working medium is the regime for which the Alfvén number A, the ratio of the magnetic and kinetic energy densities, appreciably exceeds unity. For example, for a typical MHD device [1] with characteristic length 0.1 m of the working region, velocity 1 m/sec of the medium, and magnetic induction 1 T (the medium is molten sodium at temperature 330°C) the Alfvén number is A - 900. To simplify the investigation of the processes in such devices, one can use the approximation of a strong magnetic field proposed by Somov and Syrovatskii [2] to describe certain types of hydrodynamic flows of a dissipationless plasma in a magnetic field. In the present paper, the approach to the analysis of the self-consistent magnetohydrodynamic problem in this asymptotic approximation is extended to the case of an incompressible liquid with finite conductivity. A study is made of the closed reduced system of MHD equations obtained from the complete model in the zeroth order in the small parameter A^–1, in which the magnetic field is a force-free field. An investigation is made of the free diffusion of force-free magnetic field with constant coefficient a of proportionality between the current density and the magnetic induction in a spatially unbounded liquid, and the kinematic properties of a velocity field of the liquid in which the force-free nature of the magnetic field is maintained during the damping process are determined. It is shown that the complete class of such velocity fields is represented by the group of rigid-body motions of the liquid.Translated from Izvestiya Akademii Nauk SSSR, Mekhanika Zhidkosti i Gaza, No. 1, pp. 3–9, January–February, 1991.     

Instability of a conducting drop in a variable electric field

In solving the problem of the stability of the capillary waves in a drop placed in a variable electric field a drop with an infinite set of capillary waves is treated in accordance with the Rayleigh approach as an oscillatory system with an infinite number of generalized coordinates, in particular the amplitudes of the different modes. In the problem formulation stage the general model used in [7, 8] is employed.Translated from Izvestiya Akademii Nauk SSSR, Mekhanika Zhidkosti i Gaza, No. 1, pp. 50–55, January–February, 1989.     

Nonlinear waves propagating over a conducting ideal fluid surface in an electric field

For wave perturbations of a heavy conducting fluid in an electric field orthogonal to the undisturbed surface evolutionary equations quadratically nonlinear in amplitude are obtained. Equations for the long-wave approximation are derived. A method of deriving the nonlinear and simple-wave equations is proposed. Solutions for solitary waves are considered. It is shown that even a weak electric field significantly affects the form of the soliton solution, which is related with fundamental changes in the spectrum of the linear waves.     

Parametric convection of a low-conducting liquid in an alternating electric field

The development of parametric electroconvective instability of a low-conducting liquid in a horizontal capacitor under the action of an alternating electric field is studied. The conditions on which the free charge is generated due to autonomous unipolar injection are considered. The charge distributions over the liquid at rest are determined analytically and numerically, respectively, for low and arbitrary amplitudes of the external field. The limits of parametric electroconvective instability are found within the framework of the linear theory. It is shown that the perturbations can manifest themselves in different ways depending on the modulation amplitude and frequency of the electric field and be of the subharmonic, synchronous, or quasiperiodic type of the response. The characteristics of the resonance action, namely, the amplitudes and the frequencies necessary for the efficient generation of electroconvection, are determined.     

Charged jet of an incompressible liquid in an electric field

The problem of the jet flow of an incompressible liquid with free boundaries in an electric field is solved in the approximation of a laminar boundary layer. An exact solution for a round jet is found in the class of self-similar solutions. In the case of a flat slit jet, a solution is constructed in the form of a series in powers of the coordinate transverse to the plane of symmetry. The dependence of the radius (half-width) on the longitudinal coordinate is given. Branch of the Karpov Physicochemistry Institute, State Science Center, Obninsk 249020. Karpov Physicochemistry Institute, State Science Center, Moscow 115523. Translated from Prikladnaya Mekhanika i Tekhnicheskaya Fizika, Vol. 39, No. 4, pp. 12–16, July–August, 1998.     

Convective stability of a vertical layer of a non-newtonian liquid

We consider the convective stability of a non-Newtonian (nonlinearly viscous) liquid in a two-dimensional vertical channel. We solve a nonlinear boundary value problem concerning plane-parallel stationary convection for the case of piecewise-linear and power-law type rheological characteristics. We discuss the problem concerning the stability of equilibrium and of stationary motions.Translated from Zhurnal Prikladnoi Mekhaniki i Tekhnicheskoi Fiziki, No. 5, pp. 88–95, September–October, 1973.The authors thank D. V. Lyubimov for his help in carrying out the calculations.