Eur. Phys. J. E (2014) 37: 118
https://doi.org/10.1140/epje/i2014-14118-x

Regular Article

Convection of colloidal suspensions stratified by thermodiffusion and gravity

Perm State University, Department of Physics of Phase Transitions, 15 Bukirev str., 614990, Perm, Russia

^* e-mail: bsmorodin@yandex.ru

Received: 31 July 2014
Revised: 21 October 2014
Accepted: 24 October 2014
Published online: 25 November 2014

Abstract

The convective stability thresholds and nonlinear evolution of convective rolls are numerically investigated in a plane horizontal layer of a colloidal suspension with positive separation ratio in the case of no-slip, impermeable horizontal boundaries. The characteristics of the steady and oscillatory patterns are analyzed under heating and gravity stratification. The standing and traveling waves are found as stable solutions within certain domains of parameters (on the plane of the Rayleigh and the Boltzmann numbers). Complex bifurcation and spatiotemporal properties are caused by the interaction of gravity sedimentation, Soret-induced gradients, and convective mixing of the fluid.