Kinetics and spatial organization in reactive systems with nonpassively advectedreactants

Abstract

A reactive system under the influence of a turbulent flow leads to a diversity ofkinetic regimes that result from the interplay between reaction, advection and dragforces. Inertial bias collects reactants preferentially in certain regions of the flowdepending on their density, and this fact strongly determines the overall kineticbehaviour and the spatial organization of the reactive mixture. We present aEulerian scheme for the advection terms in a kinetic mean-field model that isbetter suited to the study of nonpassively advected reactive systems than theoriginal Lagrangian approach. We show two examples of these systems: first, aformal study of the typical binary diffusion-controlled reaction , when the reactants are nonpassively advected; second, application to the study ofplankton dynamics in the ocean that reproduces the well-known periodically sustainedplankton blooms.