Eur. Phys. J. E (2015) 38: 19
https://doi.org/10.1140/epje/i2015-15019-2

Regular Article

Onset and nonlinear regimes of ternary mixture convection in a square cavity

Institute of Continuous Media Mechanics UB RAS, 614013, Perm, Russia

^* e-mail: lubimova@psu.ru

Received: 16 July 2014
Revised: 15 December 2014
Accepted: 17 February 2015
Published online: 26 March 2015

Abstract

We present the results of numerical simulations of onset and nonlinear regimes of a ternary mixture convection in a square cavity subjected to the gravity field and vertical gradients of temperature and concentration. The stability problem for the non-convective state of the mixture is solved using a software package for the investigation of the stability of flows. Nonlinear regimes of convection are studied numerically by the finite difference method. The dependences of critical parameters on the net separation ratio are obtained for the cases of heating from above and below. Numerical data on the temporal evolution of the integral characteristics of flow and heat and mass transfer and of the fields of stream function, temperature and concentration are obtained for different values of the Rayleigh number and net separation ratio.