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Pattern selection in single-component systems coupling Bénard convection and solidification

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 April 2006

S. H. Davis
Affiliation:
Department of Engineering Sciences and Applied Mathematics, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois 60201, USA
U. Müller
Affiliation:
Kernforschungszentrum Karlsruhe GMBH, Institüt fur Reaktorbauelemente, Karlsruhe, West Germany
C. Dietsche
Affiliation:
Kernforschungszentrum Karlsruhe GMBH, Institüt fur Reaktorbauelemente, Karlsruhe, West Germany

Abstract

A horizontal layer is heated from below and cooled from above so that the enclosed single-component liquid is frozen in the upper part of the layer. When the imposed temperature difference is such that the Rayleigh number across the liquid is supercritical, there is Bénard convection coupled with the dynamics of the solidification interface. An experiment is presented which shows that the interfacial corrugations that result are two-dimensional when this solid is thin but hexagonal when the solid is thick. A weakly nonlinear convective instability theory is presented which explains this behaviour, and isolates this ‘purely thermal’ mechanism of pattern selection. Jump behaviour is seen in the liquid-layer thickness at the onset of hexagonal convection.

Information

Type
Research Article
Copyright
© 1984 Cambridge University Press

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