Thermal explosion in a stirred medium

The critical conditions of a thermal explosion in a cylindrical chemical reactor with several symmetrically positioned agitators for creating a forced convection of the reaction mixture are examined. The analysis is carried out for an arbitrary Peclet number on the assumption that the flow of the fluid is laminar. The critical value of the thermal explosion parameter (Frank-Kamenetskii parameter) is determined as a function of the number of agitators, Peclet number, and the distances between the axes of the agitators and the reactor axis. In contrast to the previous studies, the dependence of the thermal explosion parameter on the rate of stirring of the medium is considered. Calculations show that, as the number of agitators and mixing rate increases, the thermal explosion probability decreases, so that the critical value of the thermal explosion parameter can be several times greater than its classical value. It is demonstrated that, depending on the values of the parameters, the problem can have four stationary solutions, two of which are stable.