Propagating fronts of convection rolls in Rayleigh–Bénard convection

We investigate the propagation of counter-rotating convection rolls in Rayleigh–Bénard convection initiated locally in a quiescent fluid layer under supercritical conditions. The velocity of the front separating quiescent fluid from the forming convection rolls, and the wavenumber of the convection rolls remaining behind the front, are explored. We numerically investigate fronts of forming convection rolls over five orders of magnitude of the reduced Rayleigh number,

, in two- and three-dimensional domains, for a broad range of boundary conditions, and for different front initiation approaches. In all cases, the front velocity increases as

epsilon Superscript 1 divided by 2 ϵ 1 / 2 $\epsilon ^{1/2}$

with increasing

epsilon ϵ $\epsilon$

for

epsilon less than or equivalent to 1 ϵ ≲ 1 $\epsilon \lesssim 1$

in agreement with predictions using the amplitude equation. The amplitude equation description of the front velocity remains accurate for

epsilon less than or equivalent to 10 ϵ ≲ 10 $\epsilon \lesssim 10$

except when the Prandtl number is large which yields a velocity that is faster than predicted for a fluid layer far from threshold. The wavenumber of the convection rolls increases linearly with

epsilon ϵ $\epsilon$

in agreement with the wavenumber that maximises the growth rate of perturbations in the linear regime. Farther from onset, the wavenumber growth transitions to a reduced scaling of

epsilon Superscript 1 divided by 4 ϵ 1 / 4 $\epsilon ^{1/4}$

in agreement with predictions using the Swift–Hohenberg equation in the large-

epsilon ϵ $\epsilon$

limit. The scalings describing the wavenumber variation with

epsilon ϵ $\epsilon$

are independent of the domain geometry, boundary conditions and front initiation method. However, the front-selected wavenumber at criticality does not equal the critical wavenumber of the bulk instability, in general, and depends significantly upon these details. We compare our results with experimental measurements where possible.