Stability of triple diffusive convection in a viscoelastic fluid-saturated porous layer

The triple diffusive convection in an Oldroyd-B fluid-saturated porous layer is investigated by performing linear and weakly nonlinear stability analyses. The condition for the onset of stationary and oscillatory is derived analytically. Contrary to the observed phenomenon in Newtonian fluids, the presence of viscoelasticity of the fluid is to degenerate the quasiperiodic bifurcation from the steady quiescent state. Under certain conditions, it is found that disconnected closed convex oscillatory neutral curves occur, indicating the requirement of three critical values of the thermal Darcy-Rayleigh number to identify the linear instability criteria instead of the usual single value, which is a novel result enunciated from the present study for an Oldroyd-B fluid saturating a porous medium. The similarities and differences of linear instability characteristics of Oldroyd-B, Maxwell, and Newtonian fluids are also highlighted. The stability of oscillatory finite amplitude convection is discussed by deriving a cubic Landau equation,and the convective heat and mass transfer are analyzed for different values of physical parameters.

Weakly nonlinear stability analysis of triple diffusive convection in a Maxwell fluid saturated porous layer

The weakly nonlinear stability of the triple diffusive convection in a Maxwell fluid saturated porous layer is investigated. In some cases, disconnected oscillatory neutral curves ave found to exist, indicating that three critical thermal Darcy-Rayleigh numbers are required to specify the linear instability criteria. However, another distinguishing feature predicted from that of Newtonian fluids is the impossibility of quasi-periodic bifurcation from the rest state. Besides, the co-dimensional two bifurcation points are located in the Darcy-Prandtl number and the stress relaxation parameter plane. It is observed that the value of the stress relaxation parameter defining the crossover between stationary and oscillatory bifurcations decreases when the Darcy-Prandtl number increases. A cubic Landau equation is derived based on the weakly nonlinear stability analysis. It is found that the bifurcating oscillatory solution is either supercritical or subcritical, depending on the choice of the physical parameters. Heat and mass transfers are estimated in terms of time and area-averaged Nusselt numbers.

Stability of buoyancy-driven convection in an Oldroyd-B fluid-saturated anisotropic porous layer

The nonlinear stability of thermal convection in a layer of an Oldroyd-B fluid-saturated Darcy porous medium with anisotropic permeability and thermal diffu- sivity is investigated with the perturbation method. A modified Darcy-Oldroyd model is used to describe the flow in a layer of an anisotropic porous medium. The results of the linear instability theory are delineated. The thresholds for the stationary and oscillatory convection boundaries are established, and the crossover boundary between them is de- marcated by identifying a codimension-two point in the viscoelastic parameter plane. The stability of the stationary and oscillatory bifurcating solutions is analyzed by deriving the cubic Landau equations. It shows that these solutions always bifurcate supercritically. The heat transfer is estimated in terms of the Nusselt number for the stationary and oscillatory modes. The result shows that, when the ratio of the thermal to mechanical anisotropy parameters increases, the heat transfer decreases.