The lowest stability and bifurcation in supercritical Taylor vortices

Abstract

Here, we numerically investigate the lowest stability and bifurcation boundary of supercritical Taylor vortices in flows with different wavenumbers and for various radius ratios; the radius ratios range from those corresponding to axisymmetrical Taylor vortex flow (TVF) to those corresponding to wavy vortex flow (WVF). The variation in the wavenumber of a supercritical TVF is found to affect the stability of the flow, because the wavenumber of the Taylor vortices remains constant only when the flow is quasi-static. The variation in the wavenumber is examined and found to be significant when the radius ratio is less than 0.7842. The results for TVF are compared with those for the flow during the quasi-static transition from TVF to WVF.