Molecular Dynamics Simulation on Stability of Converging Shocks

Abstract

Molecular Dynamic (MD) approach is applied to study the converging cylindrical shock waves in a dense Lennard-Jones (LJ) fluid. MD method is based on tracking of the atom motions and hence it has an fundamental advantages over hydrodynamic methods which assumes shocks as a structureless discontinuity and requires an equation of state. Due to the small thickness of shock fronts in liquid the two million particles is enough to simulate propagation of a cylindrical shocks in close detail. We investigate stability of converging shocks with different perturbation modes and its mixture. It was shown that in a case of relatively large initial ripples the Mach stems are formed. Supersonic jets generated by interaction of reflected shocks in downstream flow are observed. We also study the Richtmyer-Meshkov (RM) instability of an interface between two Lennard-Jones liquids of different mass densities. Surprisingly, mode 3 ripples grow very slow in comparison with higher mode numbers and growth rate of a higher mode decay slower.