INERTIAL EFFECTS IN MAGNETICALLY STABILIZED THERMOCAPILLARY CONVECTIONS DURING FLOATING-ZONE SEMICONDUCTOR CRYSTAL-GROWTH IN-SPACE

For the Roaring-zone growth of semiconductor crystals in space, striat ion-producing unsteady melt motions can be eliminated by applying a st eady magnetic field which is parallel to the common centerline of the crystal and feed rod. A previous paper [T.E. Morthland and J.S. Walker , J. Crystal Growth 158 (1996) 471] presented numerical solutions for steady thermocapillary convections neglecting the inertial terms in th e Navier-Stokes equation. With power limitations in space, achievable magnetic field strengths are large enough to eliminate unsteadiness in the melt motion, but are not large enough that inertial effects are n egligible. The numerical solutions presented here include inertial eff ects, which reduce the magnitudes of the two circulations and shift th eir centers toward the solid-melt interfaces.