Shear flow, phase change and matched asymptotic expansions: pattern formation in mushy layers (Q622344)

The paper deals with the coupling between fluid and solidification process through a corrugated mush-liquid interface. Recognizing that the permeability of the mushy layer is typically small, first it is considered the pressure perturbation at the mush-liquid interface generated by the shear flow over the corrugated surface by using a Frobenius serie approach and matched asymptotics. Then it is shown that the pressure perturbations drive a forced mode of convection within the mush layer, modifying the local properties of the dentritic medium. The authors find an analytic expression for the critical porous medium Rayleigh number, characterizing the buoyant convection, as a function of the magnitude of the external flow speed in the limit where the latent heat released at the interface is large. The obtained results have a broad range of implications in geophysical and material science.