Active media under rotational forcing

Phys Rev E Stat Nonlin Soft Matter Phys. 2006 Oct;74(4 Pt 2):046203. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevE.74.046203. Epub 2006 Oct 3.

Abstract

The bubble-free Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction has been used to study the effects of centrifugal forces on autowave propagation. The reaction parameters were chosen such that the system oscillates naturally creating target waves. In the present study, the system was forced to rotate with a constant velocity around a central axis. In studying the effects of such a forcing on the system, we focused on target dynamics. The system reacts to this forcing in different ways, the most spectacular being a dramatic increase in the period of the target, the effect growing stronger as we move away from the center of rotation. A numerical study was carried out using the two-variable Oregonator model, modified to include convective effects through the diffusion coefficient. The numerical results showed a good qualitative agreement with those of the experiments.