Interaction of a Shock Wave With a Dense Corrugated Particle Curtain

Abstract

A numerical experiment studying the gas-particle variant of the Richtmyer-Meshkov instability is presented. Using an Eulerian-Lagrangian approach, namely point particle simulations, we track trajectories of computational particles composing an initially corrugated particle curtain, after the curtain’s interaction with a shock wave. We solve the compressible multiphase Euler equations in a two-dimensional planar geometry and use state-of-the-art particle force models, including unsteady forces, for the gas-particle coupling. However, additional complexities associated with compaction of the curtain of particles to random close packing limit and beyond are avoided by limiting the simulations to relatively modest initial volume fraction of particles. At a fixed Mach number, we explore the effects of the initial perturbation amplitude, initial particle volume fraction and initial shape on the dispersal of the particle curtain. For this shock strength, our simulations suggests that the amplitude of the initial perturbation does not play a significant role in the late time particle dispersal, contrary to the volume fraction. Higher initial particle volume fraction tend to faster particles dispersal. Finally, higher frequency initial perturbations seem to be absorbed by lower frequency initial perturbations.