COMPETING REACTIONS WITH INITIALLY SEPARATED COMPONENTS

The first theoretical and experimental study of a competitive reaction with initially separated components is presented. Rich spatiotemporal reaction front patterns are produced by a simple theoretical reaction -diffusion model. Such patterns are observed experimentally for the re action Cr3+ + xylenol orange (XO) --> products. The conditions for the se front patterns are significant differences in the microscopic react ion constants and in the initial densities of the competing species.