Laplacian instability of planar streamer ionization fronts---An example of pulled front analysis (Q1015420)

Streamer ionization fronts are pulled fronts propagating into a linearly unstable state; the spatial decay of the initial condition of a planar front selects dynamically one specific long-time attractor out of a continuous family. The authors apply the Evans function techniques in a weighted space to provide the stability analysis for perturbations in the transverse direction taking account the indicated features. At first the authors recall the model equations, the construction and properties of planar fronts. In particular the multiplicity, stability, dynamical selection and convergence rate of these pulled fronts are summarized. Then the stability of these fronts is investigated as an eigenvalue problem for the dispersion relation (DR) \(s(k)\) of a linear perturbation with wave number \(k\), which depends on the far electric field \(E_{\infty}\) and the electron diffusion \(D\) as external parameters. The dispersion relations for positive \(s\) are derived numerically for a number of pair of external parameters \((E_{\infty},D)\). The numerical implementation of the Evans function uses exterior algebra to reliably solve for the higher dimensional stable and unstable manifolds. The numerical DR is tested thoroughly and confirmed with numerical simulations of the initial value problem for the complete PDE model for the particular values of \((E_{\infty},D)\). Explicit analytical asymptotic relations for the DR \(s(k)\) are derived for the limits of the small and large wave number \(k\). These asymptotic limit for small \(k\) fits the data very well, while the asymptotic limit for large \(k\) is not yet applicable in the range where \(s(k)\) is positive. After a discussion of relevant physical scales the author suggest a fit formula joining the analytical small \(k\) asymptotic limit with physically motivated guess, which fits the numerical data well for practical purposes and strongly supports the conjecture that the smallest unstable wavelength is proportional to the diffusion length that determines the leading edge of the pulled front.