Spatiotemporal patterns in thermokinetic models of cross-flow reactors

The behavior of stationary and moving spatially-periodic patterns in a simp le crossflow reactor was simulated and analyzed for a situation in which re actant is supplied continuously along the reactor and a first-order exother mic reactor occurs. The Danck-werts boundary conditions for realistic Le an d Pc values. While the unbounded (infinitely long) reactor is an asymptotic case used to study the stability of the homogeneous solution the moving wa ves that emerge in the convectively unstable unbounded system may be arrest ed at the boundaries of a bounded system and stationary waves are establish ed above some amplification threshold. Sustained periodic and aperiodic beh avior may emerge under certain conditions. The spatial behaviour in the bou nded system with Pe --> infinity is analogous to the temporal behavior of t he simple thermokinetic CSTR problem and the behavior of the distributed sy stem is classified according to that of the lumped one.