TY - JOUR
T1 - Control of radial miscible viscous fingering
AU - Sharma, Vandita
AU - Nand, Sada
AU - Pramanik, Satyajit
AU - Chen, Ching Yao
AU - Mishra, Manoranjan
PY - 2020/2/10
Y1 - 2020/2/10
N2 - We investigate the stability of radial viscous fingering (VF) in miscible fluids. We show that the instability is determined by an interplay between advection and diffusion during the initial stages of flow. Using linear stability analysis and nonlinear simulations, we demonstrate that this competition is a function of the radius of the circular region initially occupied by the less-viscous fluid in the porous medium. For each , we further determine the stability in terms of Péclet number and log-mobility ratio . The parameter space is divided into stable and unstable zones: the boundary between the two zones is well approximated by. In the unstable zone, the instability is reduced with an increase in. Thus, a natural control measure for miscible radial VF in terms of is established. Finally, the results are validated by performing experiments that provide good qualitative agreement with our numerical study. Implications for observations in oil recovery and other fingering instabilities are discussed.
AB - We investigate the stability of radial viscous fingering (VF) in miscible fluids. We show that the instability is determined by an interplay between advection and diffusion during the initial stages of flow. Using linear stability analysis and nonlinear simulations, we demonstrate that this competition is a function of the radius of the circular region initially occupied by the less-viscous fluid in the porous medium. For each , we further determine the stability in terms of Péclet number and log-mobility ratio . The parameter space is divided into stable and unstable zones: the boundary between the two zones is well approximated by. In the unstable zone, the instability is reduced with an increase in. Thus, a natural control measure for miscible radial VF in terms of is established. Finally, the results are validated by performing experiments that provide good qualitative agreement with our numerical study. Implications for observations in oil recovery and other fingering instabilities are discussed.
KW - convection in porous media
KW - fingering instability
KW - Hele-Shaw flows
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85076367358&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1017/jfm.2019.932
DO - 10.1017/jfm.2019.932
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85076367358
VL - 884
JO - Journal of Fluid Mechanics
JF - Journal of Fluid Mechanics
SN - 0022-1120
M1 - A16
ER -